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• n  an unhappy and worried mental state
• n  (physics) a secondary influence on a system that causes it to deviate slightly
• n  activity that is a malfunction, intrusion, or interruption
  the term `distress' connotes some degree of perturbation and emotional upset
• n  a disposition that is confused or nervous and upset
• n  the act of causing disorder

• Yet the tiniest perturbation could send the whole economy tumbling, and there are perturbations all over the place.
• For manufacturers of "national brands'' it was the latest package of perturbation from Macy's.
• At one stroke, amid much audience perturbation, he unmoored the taboos and let them float flamboyantly close to the mainstream.

• disturbance
• upset
• fluster
• disruption

News & Articles

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• Letters: Freedom vs equality
  There is a serious perturbation in the logic of John Kass ("This is no time to close our eyes and go to sleep," June 16). He...
  June 21, 2013 - Deseret News

Quotes

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• Russell Mittermeier in Reuters
  You're looking at a very fragile platform on which human and other life depends,Mittermeier said. "And any slight perturbation for political reasons, or whatever, results in stress within the human populations. And very often that erupts...
• Sergei Kopeikin in Science Daily (press release)
  This point of view stems from the belief that the time-dependent perturbation of the gravitational field of a uniformly moving Jupiter is too small to detect,Kopeikin said. "However, our research article clearly demonstrates that this...
• Paul Kalas in PhysOrg.com
  Theoretical simulations already hinted at a planetary perturbation around the star, but these direct images with Hubble are really bringing Fomalhaut out into the spotlight,said Paul Kalas, a research astronomer at the University of...