Root-mean-square deviation
Root-mean-square deviation (or RMSD for short) is a way of seeing how much two things are different from each other. We use it to measure how two numbers, or two sets of numbers, differ from one another.
To understand RMSD, let's look at an example. Let's say we have two sets of numbers: [1, 2, 3] and [1, 4, 5]. As you can see, the numbers 2 and 4 are different. To measure how different they are, we take the differences of each number in the two sets, like this: [1-1, 2-4, 3-5] = [0, -2, -2]. These are the differences between the two sets of numbers.
To find the RMSD, we square each of these differences ([0, -2, -2] becomes [0, 4, 4]), then add them together (0+4+4=8), and take the square root of the result (the square root of 8 is about 2.83). This number (2.83) is the RMSD. So the RMSD tells us the difference between our two sets of numbers - it is 2.83.
To understand RMSD, let's look at an example. Let's say we have two sets of numbers: [1, 2, 3] and [1, 4, 5]. As you can see, the numbers 2 and 4 are different. To measure how different they are, we take the differences of each number in the two sets, like this: [1-1, 2-4, 3-5] = [0, -2, -2]. These are the differences between the two sets of numbers.
To find the RMSD, we square each of these differences ([0, -2, -2] becomes [0, 4, 4]), then add them together (0+4+4=8), and take the square root of the result (the square root of 8 is about 2.83). This number (2.83) is the RMSD. So the RMSD tells us the difference between our two sets of numbers - it is 2.83.
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