prime implicant

Meaning

Noun

• A group of related 1's (implicant) on a Karnaugh map which is not subsumed by any other implicant in the same map. Equivalently (in terms of Boolean algebra), a product term which is a "minimal" implicant in the sense that removing any of its literals will yield a product term which is not an implicant (but beware: on a Karnaugh map it would appear "maximal").
• A group of related 0's (implicant) on a Karnaugh map which is not subsumed by any other implicant (of 0's) in the same map.

Origin

• An implicant (Boolean product term) which is called "prime" because none of its proper factors is itself an implicant.