Wick
A wick is a stable or oscillating linearly repeating pattern. The essential characteristic distinguishing it from an agar is that it is one-dimensional. A fuse is a wick that burns from one end.
Conversely, a wickstretcher is a moving entity, usually a spaceship, which lengthens the segment of wick to which it is conjoined. Various combinations are possible: two stretchers moving in opposite directions could prolong a finite wick; one end could possibly be freestanding or require stabilization, a service rendered by a fencepost.
A wick could simply be infinite in extent, possibly quite convoluted in the style of a Hilbert curve. Or without any evident termination except for possibly closing into a loop.
The vex is a period-41 wick which can be stabilised by fenceposts comprised of copies of 204P41. It is historically notable because, though it had previously been stabilised using period-41 glider streams from pseudo-period guns of period 82, any completion of it with true period 41 (before 204P41's completion) would have been the first period-41 oscillator.
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See also
External links
- Wick at the Life Lexicon