burst

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“
GRB 080319B seized the attention of the world when it became clear that the burst was actually bright enough to be visible to the unaided eye, cresting at a magnitude of 5.3 even though the star that spawned it was located over 7.5 billion light years away.

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Definitions (46)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (15)

  1. intransitive verb To come open or fly apart suddenly or violently, especially from internal pressure.
  2. intransitive verb To explode.
  3. intransitive verb To be or seem to be full to the point of breaking open: The sacks were bursting with grain.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (16)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (3)

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Examples (50)

  • And they burst, and they spill their guts into the bread. —  Peter Reinhart on bread
  • And when it burst, the size of his country bubble is the size of the population. —  Hans Rosling shows the best stats you've ever seen
  • A burst from a Russian machine gun had just hissed over his head, when the turret hatch opened and the face of the tank's commander appeared. —  Panzer Aces
  • The bonds of age were burst, although his quaint complaint about himself that very evening was, 'You know I want a minute or two to get in motion Despite bowed shoulders and rusty joints, he still had something of the lithe, strenuous carriage of his youth. —  The Romance of a Pro-Consul
  • Garbage bags hit the ground and burst, and a glass jar clinked onto the blacktop, rolled between the bags and came to rest a few feet from where I was standing. —  Four To Score
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Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

flash ·  wave ·  rush ·  shoot ·  cry ·  blast ·  fire ·  feel ·  stream ·  storm ·  flood ·  tear

Used in the same contextWord Family

burst:   bursts ·  bursting
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English bursten, from Old English berstan.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. English dial, also brust, brest, brast; from Middle English bersten, bresten, bristen (preterit barst, berst brast, plural bursten, past participle bursten, borsten, brosten), from Anglo-Saxon berstan for *brestan (preterit bærst, plural burston, past participle borsten) = Old Saxon brestan = OFries. bersta = Dutch bersten = Middle Low German bersten, barsten, borsten, Low German barsten = Old High German brestan, Middle High German bresten, German bersten = Icelandic bresta = Swedish brista = Danish briste, all orig. intransitive, burst, break asunder; prob. allied to Anglo-Saxon brecan, English break, etc. Cf. Irish brisim, I break, Gael, bris, brisd, break: see bruise. The spelling with u instead of e is partly due to the preterit and past participle forms.
  2. from burst, v.
 

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/bərst/
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