SPEED OF LIGHT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does speed of light mean? 

• SPEED OF LIGHT (noun)
  The noun SPEED OF LIGHT has 1 sense:

1. the speed at which light travels in a vacuum; the constancy and universality of the speed of light is recognized by defining it to be exactly 299,792,458 meters per second

  Familiarity information: SPEED OF LIGHT used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SPEED OF LIGHT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The speed at which light travels in a vacuum; the constancy and universality of the speed of light is recognized by defining it to be exactly 299,792,458 meters per second

Classified under:

Nouns denoting time and temporal relations

Synonyms:

c; light speed; speed of light

Hypernyms ("speed of light" is a kind of...):

constant (a number representing a quantity assumed to have a fixed value in a specified mathematical context)

speed; velocity (distance travelled per unit time)

 Context examples 

The whole composite vision was achieved with the speed of light, producing no pause in the conversation, nor interrupting his calm train of thought.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Hubble clocked material whirling around the black hole as moving at more than 10% of the speed of light.

(Hubble Uncovers Black Hole Disk that Shouldn't Exist, NASA)

Another idea is that the universe contains a previously unknown new subatomic particle that travels close to the speed of light.

(Measuring Growth of Universe Reveals a Mystery, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

A unit of length that would be traversed in a period of one year by an object moving at the speed of light in a vacuum (2.99792458E8 meters per second).

(Light-Year, NCI Thesaurus)

Because all supermassive black holes are so distant, gravitational waves, which travel at the speed of light, take a long time to arrive at Earth.

(Listening for Gravitational Waves Using Pulsars, NASA)

Mysteries linger about why particles get such a huge energy boost around black holes, forming dramatic jets that surge away from the poles of black holes at nearly the speed of light.

(Black Hole Image Makes History, NASA)

Nearest the black hole, the gas orbits at close to the speed of light, while the outer portions spin a bit more slowly.

(NASA Visualization Shows a Black Hole’s Warped World, NASA)

It is difficult to trap and store a photon, which by definition moves at the speed of light.

(Key Tech for Quantum Communications Offered by Implanting Diamonds with Flaws, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

If you feel professional progress has been too slow, considering how hard you’ve worked, that will change now, and events will move forward at the speed of light starting January 10.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

This neutrino traveled 3.7 billion years at almost the speed of light before being detected on Earth.

(NASA’s Fermi Traces Source of Cosmic Neutrino to Monster Black Hole, NASA)