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Greek alphabet
Obsolete letters
Other characters
	Heta
	Greek diacritics

For Latin ɣ, see Latin gamma. For other uses, see Gamma (disambiguation).

Look up Γ or γ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Gamma uppercase Γ, lowercase γ; Greek: Γάμμα) is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals it has a value of 3. It was derived from the Phoenician letter Gimel . Letters that arose from Gamma include the Roman C and G and the Cyrillic letters Ge Г and Ghe Ґ.

In Modern Greek, it represents either a voiced velar fricative /ɣ/ or a voiced palatal fricative /ʝ/. In Ancient Greek, it represented a voiced velar stop /ɡ/. Before velars, it represents a velar nasal /ŋ/ in Modern as well as Ancient Greek, and a double gamma represents the sequence /ŋɡ/ (phonetically varying [ŋɡ~ɡ]) or /ŋɣ/.

[edit] Gamma combinations

The gamma can be combined with other letters or itself.

A double gamma (γγ) is pronounced like the ng in "finger"
A gamma with xi (γξ) is pronounced roughly like the nx in "sphinx"
(γχ) is pronounced like the nkh in "ankh"
A gamma combined with kappa (γκ) is pronounced like the nk in "banker"

[edit] Use as a symbol or a term

The lower-case letter $γ$ is used as a symbol for:

gamma radiation in nuclear physics
surface energy in materials science
the Lorentz factor in theory of relativity
The heat capacity ratio Cp/Cv in thermodynamics
gamma oscillation in neuroscience
the power by which the luminance of an image is increased in gamma correction
The Euler–Mascheroni constant
Phonetics uses gamma as the symbol for the voiced velar fricative
In mechanical engineering,
- specific weight
- The shear rate of a fluid is represented by a lower case gamma with a dot above it: $\dot \gamma$

The upper-case letter $Γ$ is used as a symbol for:

In mathematics, the gamma function (usually written as $Γ$ -function) is an extension of the factorial to complex numbers
circulation in fluid mechanics
As reflection coefficient in physics and electrical engineering

[edit] See also