English
expansion
Etymology

From French expansion, from Latin expānsiō.

Pronunciation
  • IPA: /ɪkˈspænʃən/
Noun

expansion

  1. An act, process, or instance of expanding.
    The expansion of metals and plastics in response to heat is well understood.
    1. The fractional change in unit length per unit length per unit temperature change.
      Look up the expansion of 1018 steel at stick welding temps and figure out how far this thing's gonna bend once we weld it up.
      Synonyms: coefficient of thermal expansion
      Hypernyms: temperature coefficient
    2. (building) A new addition.
      My new office is in the expansion behind the main building.
      Synonyms: annex
    3. A product to be used with a previous product.
      This expansion requires the original game board.
    4. That which is expanded; expanse; extended surface.
    5. (steam engines) The operation of steam in a cylinder after its communication with the boiler has been cut off, by which it continues to exert pressure upon the moving piston.
    6. The replacement of a short name (e.g., acronym, initialism, alphanumeric symbol, abbreviation) with the longer name that is synonymous with it, as when spelling out acronyms to ensure clarity for a general audience.
      Expansion of acronyms is often helpful for nonexpert readers (anacronyms excluded).
      1. The string of text thus substituted.
        The acronym "FNDs" can mean either "functional neurologic disorders" or "focal neurologic deficits", so you'd better use the expansion instead of the acronym, for clarity in this context; readers of this paragraph may not have read, or remember, which definition you used 40 pages earlier.
    7. (video games) Short for expansion pack.
Antonyms Translations Translations Translations

This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.001
Offline English dictionary