Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The act of scintillating.
- n. A spark; a flash.
- n. Astronomy Rapid variation in the light of a celestial body caused by turbulence in Earth's atmosphere; a twinkling.
- n. Physics A flash of light produced in a phosphor by absorption of an ionizing particle or photon.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The act of scintillating, or emitting sparks or spark-like flashes of light; the act of sparkling.
- n. A flash; a spark.
- n. Specifically, the twinkling or tremulous motion of the light of the larger fixed stars. By shaking the head, so as to elongate the image, it is seen that not merely the intensity, but also the color of the light varies. See
scintillometer .
Wiktionary
- n. A flash of light; a spark
- n. astronomy The twinkling of a star caused by turbulence in the Earth's atmosphere
- n. physics The flash of light produced by a phosphor when it absorbs ionizing radiation
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The act of scintillating.
- n. A spark or flash emitted in scintillating.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a rapid change in brightness; a brief spark or flash
- n. (physics) a flash of light that is produced in a phosphor when it absorbs a photon or ionizing particle
- n. the quality of shining with a bright reflected light
- n. a brilliant display of wit
- n. the twinkling of the stars caused when changes in the density of the earth's atmosphere produce uneven refraction of starlight
Examples
“The process involved the tiresome task of the chemical separation of the element, its purification, and the final concentration on a small surface. 92 Since polonium did not emit beta particles that usually interfered in scintillation counting, its use as a radioactive source was most advantageous.”
“Chadwick's careful surveillance, 25 and he eventually assigned specific research projects to them after a short introductory course which included training in scintillation counting.”
“Finally, several of the persons mentioned must act as counters in scintillation observations when the ordinary disintegration apparatus or the mass spectrographs are used. 170”
“Our particular kind of work requires the close and continued collaboration of at least half a dozen highly specialized workers: one for preparing and calibrating the screens and the absorption foils used in scintillation counts; one for preparing the disintegration apparatus itself, the substances which are to be investigated in it and the gas with which it is filled; one for working the mass spectrograph and its auxiliary instruments; and one specialist on photography ...”
“It's called a scintillation counter, and it's been specially adapted for this search.”
“And farther, that that motion, whereby the fire worketh, is dilatation, and contraction of itself alternately, commonly called scintillation or glowing, is manifest also by experience.”
“The gamma camera has a large crystal detector (called a scintillation crystal).”
“New apparatus such as scintillation counters and photographic emulsions were developed in order to detect individual particles.”
“Every kind of scintillation flashed from the gem-incrusted dishes.”
“The technical term is "scintillation," connoting minimal signification, the minutest re-marking that makes a wink of a photon.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘scintillation’.
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Specifically
Being a list of words which have "specifically" in their definitions.
recompose, specifically, Dutch, abstinence, discipline, virtue, namely, opening, century, amalgamation, cup, second and 303 more...
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SCI -words
scintilla is the most favoured one
with 95 listings
ironically more than a scintilla of recognitionsciaenid, sciaenoid, sciamachy, sciarid, sciatic, sciatica, sciatical, science, scienced, scient, scienter, sciental and 70 more...
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wit
with wit mess (between less & ness)
wit, wot, wote, wost, wist, weeting, sense, wite, witticism, insulse, wittiness, wittiness witness and 31 more...
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Personal Vocabulary List
All my favourite words that I come across!
veritable, incongruence, rigamorole, letcherous, revolting, repulsive, reputrid, rapatious, forays, guise, placate, paradigm and 1162 more...
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C. S. Bird – Grandiloquent Dictionary
All the words from the Grandiloquent Dictionary.
946 of these 2700 words do not yield any results in six different dictionaries, hence many of them might be misspellings.
More in...abacinate, abcedarian, abderian, ablegate, abligurition, ablutophobia, abnormous, acarophobia, acathasia, accipitrine, accidia, accubitus and 2690 more...
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2008 Wordlist
Hopefully, I'll be using this site for more than one year. It will be fun then to look back and see what new words I found worthy of notice in any given year.
All words spotted in 2008...longanimity, permalancer, breeder, biodegradable, handicapable, gender-neutral, translator, interpreter, translation, interpreting, kleptocracy, fanfiction and 1598 more...
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Speak, Memory
Words gathered while reading Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov.
cracknel, shingly, glaucous, stretcherman, goodish, loden, gutticle, percha, plasticine, instar, wellhole, camera-lucida and 357 more...
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logicalbiscotti's omniglottery
i heart words.
lolligag, defenestrate, dammsuga, kakumei, in cahoots, spleen, hubris, epoch, anaphylaxis, lummox, tincture, schadenfreude and 156 more...
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of all things bright
light words.
effulgent, lustrous, incandescent, dazzling, luminous, lambent, lucent, glistening, light, luster, brilliance, twinkle and 14 more...
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easily forgotten
parsimony, vicarious, egregious, intercalation, epiphyte, alexandrine, parturition, eldritch, coruscation, scintillation, sesquipedalian, penumbra and 23 more...
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Light
words about light
lucent, lambent, glimmering, aglow, pearly, shimmery, scintillation, flouresce, starshine, halogen, mercury vapor, sodium vapor and 28 more...
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miss.tph's list
deception, deceiving, ubiquitous, superfluous, futile, futile, scintillation, cessation, spleen, loquacious, Absolute, diatribe
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Miscellany, pt. s
stythe, sick-abed, skin diving, shellfish, sanguinivorous, sessile, spondylolysis, schlimazel, siliquiferous, singultus, scintillation, sivatherium and 37 more...
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Sparkly words
glitter, effervescence, coruscation, scintillation, glister, spangle, luster, gleam
Tweets
Looking for tweets for scintillation.
yarb CD getting cosmic on our asses. Apr 11, 2011
hernesheir *shakes his head* Apr 11, 2011
ruzuzu "Specifically, the twinkling or tremulous motion of the light of the larger fixed stars. By shaking the head, so as to elongate the image, it is seen that not merely the intensity, but also the color of the light varies."
--Century Dictionary Apr 11, 2011