# autodifferentiation
## English
### Etymology

From auto- +‎ differentiation.

### Noun

autodifferentiation (uncountable)
* (mathematics, computing) The automatic differentiation of a function by a computer.
    Synonym: automatic differentiation
** 2021, Joe Papa, PyTorch Pocket Reference, page 48:The backward function uses PyTorch's automatic differentiation package, torch.autograd, to differentiate and compute gradients of tensors based on the chain rule. Here's a simple example of autodifferentiation.
* (biology) Automatic differentiation and specialization of cells; autonomous development.
** 1981, C. R. Austin, Colin Russell Austin, Robert Geoffrey, Mechanisms of Sex Differentiation in Animals and Man, page 66:Spermatogenic cells appear to be incapable of autodifferentiation in an anhormonal environment.
** 2012, Karl Maramorosch, Invertebrate Tissue Culture: Research Applications, page 67:Undifferentiated gonia undergo autodifferentiation to oocytes in the absence of any hormone.
** 2012, J Thomas, Organ Culture, page 89:The undifferentiated dorsal skin of the tail bud of a 9—10 day duck embryo, cultured on a natural medium containing embryo extract, underwent autodifferentiation to produce, within 8-10 days, the typical glandular invaginations (7).
** 2019, Valentina Grumezescu, Alexandru Mihai Grumezescu, Materials for Biomedical Engineering: Biopolymer Fibers, page 360:Singh et al. (2013) reported that a coating of fibronectin (attachment protein) on SF/CE membrane exhibited enhanced adhesion and autodifferentiation of stem cells.
* The differentiation of a whole into distinct parts; self-differentiation.
** 2012, Giulio Maspero, Robert J. Wozniak, Rethinking Trinitarian Theology, page 136:This relation and alterity of Jesus before the Father is understood as autodifferentiation, a key word of the German author's Trinitarian theology: 'Self-differentiating himself from the Father, submitting himself as his creature to his will and thus making it the place of his divinity, what is equally required of all of his predications on the Kingdom of God is precisely the manner in which Jesus shows himself as the Son of God, one with the Father who sent Him.'
** 2016, Yubraj Aryal, Between Foucault and Derrida:Refusing the model of exclusion, that is, of an expulsion that produces an outside, Derrida holds that an 'original act' of severance, if it is not to imply a metaphysics of presence, can only be an autodifferentiation: 'a self-dividing action' 'interior to logos in general', to 'a logos that preceded the split of reason and madness, a logos which within itself permitted dialogue between what were later called reason and madness'.
** 2021, Alistair Rolls, Marguerite Johnson, Remembering Paris in Text and Film:Importantly, where intertextual approaches such as that offered by Rolls in this volume (in Chapter 7 below) trace the origins of the muted voice inside the host, or source, text's louder ones to another text, translation hears and renders audible, multiple origins in the one source. This is a particularly interesting form of autodifferentiation, one that is highly compatible with Baudelaire's ever-unsettled Paris.

#### Derived terms

* autodiff