APERTURE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does aperture mean? 

• APERTURE (noun)
  The noun APERTURE has 3 senses:

1. a device that controls amount of light admitted

2. a natural opening in something

3. an man-made opening; usually small

  Familiarity information: APERTURE used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• APERTURE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A device that controls amount of light admitted

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("aperture" is a kind of...):

regulator (any of various controls or devices for regulating or controlling fluid flow, pressure, temperature, etc.)

Holonyms ("aperture" is a part of...):

camera; photographic camera (equipment for taking photographs (usually consisting of a lightproof box with a lens at one end and light-sensitive film at the other))

scope; telescope (a magnifier of images of distant objects)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A natural opening in something

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

Hypernyms ("aperture" is a kind of...):

hole (an opening into or through something)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "aperture"):

pupil (the contractile aperture in the center of the iris of the eye; resembles a large black dot)

micropyle (minute opening in the wall of an ovule through which the pollen tube enters)

pore; stoma; stomate (a minute epidermal pore in a leaf or stem through which gases and water vapor can pass)

Holonyms ("aperture" is a part of...):

eye; oculus; optic (the organ of sight)

Sense 3

Meaning:

An man-made opening; usually small

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("aperture" is a kind of...):

opening (a vacant or unobstructed space that is man-made)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "aperture"):

embouchure; mouthpiece (the aperture of a wind instrument into which the player blows directly)

mouthpiece (a part that goes over or into the mouth of a person)

 Context examples 

With the autopilot engaged, the synthetic aperture radar is able to acquire repeat-pass data that can measure land-surface changes within fractions of an inch (centimeters).

(NASA airborne research focuses on Andean volcanoes, NASA)

Observers with the European Space Agency and the European Southern Observatory were the first to recapture 2012 TC4, in late July 2017, using one of their large 8-meter aperture telescopes.

(Asteroid Tracking Network Observes Close Approach, NASA)

Was it, I asked myself, a ray from the moon penetrating some aperture in the blind?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

With 75 cm aperture, it will cover a wider viewing range and will be able to map a larger area than any other telescope in Brazil.

(High tech Russian telescope to start operating in Brazil, Agência Brasil)

A band of muscular fibers of the oblique arytenoid muscle that extends from the summit of the arytenoid cartilage to the side of the epiglottis and whose action constricts the laryngeal aperture.

(Aryepiglottic Muscle, NCI Thesaurus)

An aperture or hole leading into something, especially a bodily cavity.

(Opening, NCI Thesaurus)

It is essentially avascular but contains apertures for vessels, lymphatics, and nerves.

(Murine Sclera, NCI Thesaurus)

It is continuous with the central canal of the cord below and with the CEREBRAL AQUEDUCT above, and through its lateral and median apertures it communicates with the subarachnoid space.

(Fourth Ventricle, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)

The act of expanding an aperture.

(Dilate, NCI Thesaurus)

The woman was standing in the aperture, the darkness of the hall behind her, the yellow light from my lamp beating upon her eager and beautiful face.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)