SPOTTING

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does spotting mean? 

• SPOTTING (noun)
  The noun SPOTTING has 2 senses:

1. the act of spotting or staining something

2. the act of detecting something; catching sight of something

  Familiarity information: SPOTTING used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SPOTTING (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The act of spotting or staining something

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

maculation; spotting; staining

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

dirtying; soiling; soilure (the act of soiling something)

Derivation:

spot (make a spot or mark onto)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The act of detecting something; catching sight of something

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

catching; detection; espial; spotting; spying

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

discovery; find; uncovering (the act of discovering something)

Derivation:

spot (catch sight of)

 Context examples 

One method of spotting cancer early is to find biomarkers—substances in the body that signal the presence of a disease.

(Method for Early Detection of Pancreatic Cancer, NIH)

But if you are pregnant and have bleeding or spotting, contact your health care provider immediately.

(Miscarriage, NIH: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development)

In the process, they created the largest guide to spotting dark matter in the cosmos ever drawn.

(New Clues to Universe's Structure Revealed, NASA)

Now, eight years after spotting this mysterious bit of atmospheric fluff, researchers have determined that it contains methane ice, which produces a much denser cloud than the ethane ice previously identified there.

(NASA Finds Methane Ice Cloud in Titan's Stratosphere, NASA)

Based on photographs of RMS Titanic at the shipyard that built it in Belfast, Ireland, he suggested fire by spotting large black streaks in the region struck by the iceberg.

(UK documentary claims fire weakened RMS Titanic, Wikinews)

The researchers observed that enough CO2 was transferred from the magma into gas over the days before eruption to indicate that CO2 monitoring could be a useful way of spotting the precursors to eruptions in Iceland.

(‘Crystal clocks’ used to time magma storage before volcanic eruptions, University of Cambridge)

The program also outperformed doctors in spotting patients with Angelman syndrome and Cornelia de Lange syndrome—an inherited genetic mutation that can cause, among other symptoms, low-set ears and an upturned nose—versus other disorders, and in separating patients with different genetic subtypes of Noonan syndrome.

(Artificial Intelligence Can Be Used to Diagnose Rare Disorders with Just A Picture, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)