circulation

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Movement in a circle or circuit, especially the movement of blood through bodily vessels as a result of the heart's pumping action.
2. n. Movement or passage through a system of vessels, as of water through pipes; flow.
3. n. Free movement or passage.
4. n. The passing of something, such as money or news, from place to place or person to person.
5. n. The condition of being passed about and widely known; distribution.
6. n. Dissemination of printed material, especially copies of newspapers or magazines, among readers.
7. n. The number of copies of a publication sold or distributed.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. The act of circulating or moving in a circle or circuit; movement in such a manner as to go forth and return to the starting-point: as, the circulation of the blood (see phrases below).
2. n. The act or state of being diffused or distributed; the act of passing from point to point or from person to person; diffusion: as, the circulation of sap in a tree; the circulation of money; the circulation of a piece of news.
3. n. The extent to which a thing circulates or is diffused or distributed: as, the circulation of the two periodicals was about 300,000 copies.
4. n. A repetition of a series of things or events in the same order.
5. n. The amount of coin, notes, bills, etc., in actual use as currency: as, the circulation of the national banks.
6. n. In chem., the repeated vaporization and condensation of a substance in distillation.
7. n. In mathematics, the amount of flow round a closed path or circuit; the line-integral round a closed curve of the component velocity of a fluid along the curve.

Wiktionary

1. n. The act of moving in a circle, or in a course which brings the moving body to the place where its motion began.
2. n. The act of passing from place to place or person to person; free diffusion; transmission.
3. n. Currency; circulating coin; notes, bills, etc., current for coin.
4. n. The extent to which anything circulates or is circulated; the measure of diffusion; as, the circulation of a newspaper.
5. n. The movement of the blood in the blood-vascular system, by which it is brought into close relations with almost every living elementary constituent. Also the movement of the sap in the vessels and tissues of plants.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The act of moving in a circle, or in a course which brings the moving body to the place where its motion began.
2. n. The act of passing from place to place or person to person; free diffusion; transmission.
3. n. Currency; circulating coin; notes, bills, etc., current for coin.
4. n. The extent to which anything circulates or is circulated; the measure of diffusion.
5. n. (Physiol.) The movement of the blood in the blood-vascular system, by which it is brought into close relations with almost every living elementary constituent. Also, the movement of the sap in the vessels and tissues of plants.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. the dissemination of copies of periodicals (as newspapers or magazines)
2. n. number of copies of a newspaper or magazine that are sold
3. n. movement through a circuit; especially the movement of blood through the heart and blood vessels
4. n. (library science) the count of books that are loaned by a library over a specified period
5. n. free movement or passage (as of cytoplasm within a cell or sap through a plant)
6. n. the spread or transmission of something (as news or money) to a wider group or area