TROUGH

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does trough mean? 

• TROUGH (noun)
  The noun TROUGH has 6 senses:

1. a narrow depression (as in the earth or between ocean waves or in the ocean bed)

2. a channel along the eaves or on the roof; collects and carries away rainwater

3. a concave shape with an open top

4. a treasury for government funds

5. a long narrow shallow receptacle

6. a container (usually in a barn or stable) from which cattle or horses feed

  Familiarity information: TROUGH used as a noun is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• TROUGH (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A narrow depression (as in the earth or between ocean waves or in the ocean bed)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

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

depression; natural depression (a sunken or depressed geological formation)

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

swale (a low area (especially a marshy area between ridges))

Sense 2

Meaning:

A channel along the eaves or on the roof; collects and carries away rainwater

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

gutter; trough

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

channel (a passage for water (or other fluids) to flow through)

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

chute; slide; slideway; sloping trough (sloping channel through which things can descend)

cullis (a gutter in a roof)

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

gable roof; saddle roof; saddleback; saddleback roof (a double sloping roof with a ridge and gables at each end)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A concave shape with an open top

Classified under:

Nouns denoting two and three dimensional shapes

Synonyms:

bowl; trough

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

concave shape; concavity; incurvation; incurvature (a shape that curves or bends inward)

Sense 4

Meaning:

A treasury for government funds

Classified under:

Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession

Synonyms:

public treasury; till; trough

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

exchequer; treasury (the funds of a government or institution or individual)

Sense 5

Meaning:

A long narrow shallow receptacle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

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

receptacle (a container that is used to put or keep things in)

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

cradle; rocker (a trough that can be rocked back and forth; used by gold miners to shake auriferous earth in water in order to separate the gold)

Sense 6

Meaning:

A container (usually in a barn or stable) from which cattle or horses feed

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

manger; trough

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

container (any object that can be used to hold things (especially a large metal boxlike object of standardized dimensions that can be loaded from one form of transport to another))

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

bunk; feed bunk (a long trough for feeding cattle)

 Context examples 

Red-Cap carried until the great trough was quite full.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

The lamp still stood upon the floor where I had placed it when examining the trough.

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

The world belongs to the strong—to the strong who are noble as well and who do not wallow in the swine-trough of trade and exchange.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Once he got up and walked over to the trough for a drink of water.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

They are irregular in amplitude and frequency and are visually quantitated as the amplitude of the peak to trough in beats per minute.

(Fetal Heart Rate Variability, NCI Thesaurus)

The trough concentration at steady state divided by the trough concentration during the initial dosing interval.

(Accumulation Ratio Ctrough, NCI Thesaurus)

At the door of a cottage I saw a little girl about to throw a mess of cold porridge into a pig trough.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

The next instant they were opposite the poop, where stood Wolf Larsen and I. We were falling in the trough, they were rising on the surge.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

Some of these troughs have darker material within them, while others are traced by clumps of hills that appear to rise above the surrounding terrain.

(New Horizons Discovers Frozen Plains in the Heart of Pluto’s ‘Heart’, NASA)

The ACR focuses its activity on making imaging safe, effective and accessible trough its accreditation programs, research, and development of guidelines for quality imaging, and education.

(American College of Radiology, NCI Thesaurus)