Link Centre Dictionary

B

UK/b/ US/biː/ common uk

noun

1.

the blood group whose red cells carry the B antigen

Synonyms
2.

aerobic rod-shaped spore-producing bacterium; often occurring in chainlike formations; found primarily in soil

Synonyms
3.
4.

a trivalent metalloid element; occurs both in a hard black crystal and in the form of a yellow or brown powder

Synonyms
5.

a logarithmic unit of sound intensity equal to 10 decibels

Synonyms
6.

(physics) a unit of nuclear cross section; the effective circular area that one particle presents to another as a target for an encounter

Synonyms
7.

the 2nd letter of the Roman alphabet

Origin

Possibly a contraction of BCPL (“Basic Combined Programming Language”), the name of a programming language from which B was derived. Dennis Ritchie (a coworker of B’s designer, Ken Thompson) speculated that B might be based on Bon (the name of an earlier, but unrelated, programming language that Thompson designed for use on Multics), itself either from Bonnie (the name of Thompson’s wife) or “(according to an encyclopedia quotation in its manual), after a religion whose rituals involve the murmuring of magic formulas”.

Phrases

  • A-B power
  • A-B powering
  • antihemophilic factor B
  • Area B
  • b flat
  • B meson
  • b sharp
  • B story
  • B virus
  • basic B
  • chlorophyll b
  • menty b others

Related words

Broader terms

Narrower terms

Parts

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.