TOEFL® Vocabulary Flashcard

Acoustics can mean both “the qualities of a room to reflect sound waves” and the study of sound creation, transmission and reception. So your university major can be Acoustics and after graduation you might be hired by concert halls to improve the acoustics, meaning to improve how sound is carried through the room.

Definition: Amplitude is the objective measurement of the degree of change (positive or negative) in atmospheric pressure (the compression and rarefaction of air molecules) caused by sound waves.

Example sentences:

Definition: alike in some way

Example sentences:

• The action of light waves is analogous to the action of sound waves

Definition: Hard but liable to break easily

Example sentences:

• The Earth's crust, as with many planetary crusts, is brittle and breaks relatively easily.

Definition: The power of a liquid to keep something afloat

Example sentences:

• Water's buoyancy makes a swimmer feel weightless and reduces stress on joints in the spine, hips and knees.

Definition: selecting what seems best of various styles or ideas

Example sentences:

• The home, most recently featured in an issue of Interiors magazine, showcases an eclectic mix of antiques, flea market finds and contemporary art.
• She has an electric taste in music, from hard rock to classical.

Definition: A stable subatomic particle with a charge of negative electricity, found in all atoms and acting as the primary carrier of electricity in solids

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Definition: Of or denoting a scale of temperature on which water freezes at 32° and boils at 212° under standard conditions

Example sentences:

• The temperature was steady at 65° Fahrenheit.

Definition: The force that attracts a body towards the centre of the earth, or towards any other physical body having mass

Example sentences:

• Objects exert a force of gravity because they have mass and the more mass they have the stronger the force of gravity they exert. Physics has found only four forces in nature: gravity, electromagnetism, weak nuclear, and strong nuclear.

Definition: the quality of a color as determined by its dominant wavelength

Example sentences:

• When a full moon makes its closest approach to Earth, it appears slightly bigger and brighter than usual and has a reddish hue.
• The heat of the firework can help change the shade of the color, with hotter temperatures burning into paler hues.

The adjective inaudible describes something that is impossible to hear. You are likely to see this word in academic textbooks. The phrase ‘be inaudible to someone’ is often used. For example:

• Sounds of frequencies higher than 20,000 Hz are inaudible to humans, while dogs can hear sounds up to a frequency of 45,000 Hz.
• Ultrasound is an inaudible sound wave to humans.

Inaudible is the negated form of audible, so instead of using “dogs can hear” you could form a sentence like this:

• Sounds up to a frequency of 45,000 Hz are audible to dogs.

Definition: Relating to or resulting from motion

Example sentences:

• For Wight, nature's timelessness transcends kinetic motion and the realm of the ticking clock.

Definition: A piece of iron (or an ore, alloy, or other material)

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• Understanding more complex substances is the key to designing materials for stronger magnets in order to build more efficient and powerful electrical generators and motors.
• Iron, cobalt and nickel are the best known metallic magnets, and their magnetic properties are governed by the conduction electrons that are free to move throughout the metal.

Definition: Capable of being attracted by or acquiring the properties of a magnet:

Example sentences:

• Most materials are not ferromagnetic, but there are a variety of magnetic effects that other materials exhibit.
• That is that it is attracted by the magnetic field but does not remain magnetic once it leaves the field.

Definition: A physical phenomenon produced by the motion of electric charge, resulting in attractive and repulsive forces between objects

Example sentences:

• Relativity would arrive, not from concerns over the flaws in Newton's mechanics, but rather from contemplating the forces of electricity and magnetism as well as the mysteries of light.

Definition: Give magnetic properties to; make magnetic

Example sentences:

• Because the string is magnetized, the magnetic field surrounding it will also vibrate with the string.
• Placing it close enough to a magnet or placing it in a strong electromagnetic field can magnetize non - magnetized magnetite.
• When the material is magnetized, usually by applying a high intensity pulse from an external magnetizing field, many of the individual domains rotate so that they are aligned with the external field.

Definition: Something that deceives the eye by appearing to be other than it is

Example sentences:

• Consider the famous optical illusion of two identical lines where one has concave triangles at its edges whilst the other has convex triangles at either end.

Definition: Vary in magnitude or position in a regular manner about a central point

Example sentences:

• The light made the electrons in each atom oscillate back and forth from one side of the atom to the other

Definition: (Especially of a liquid) flow over the brim of a receptacle

Example sentences:

• chemicals overflowed from a storage tank

Definition: a tiny piece of anything

Example sentences:

• Particles of dust can destroy electronic instruments.
• At the smallest scales, everything in the universe can be broken down into fundamental morsels called particles.

Definition: A solid geometric figure whose two ends are similar, equal, and parallel rectilinear figures, and whose sides are parallelograms.

Example sentences:

• We will show that the area of this ring is equal to the area of the corresponding cross section of the dome, which implies that the dome and the punctured prism have equal volumes.

Definition: Drive or force (an attack or attacker) back or away;(Of a substance) resist mixing with or be impervious to (another substance):

Example sentences:

• In the physical world, once an attacker is repelled, you follow up with counterattack
• The glass, coated with microscopic chemical coatings, has properties which repel moisture and dirt, allowing them to be washed away during normal rainy weather.

Definition: (Of a substance or object) able to recoil or spring back into shape after bending, stretching, or being compressed

Example sentences:

• Foam is resilient, keeps its shape and comes in a range of densities.

The noun “resonance” means the quality of a sound that stays loud, clear, and deep for a long time. Here is an example sentence:

• There is a great resonance in this singer’s voice

The adjective “resonant” describes sound that is deep and rich. For example:

• The church bell is resonant.

When you say a sound resonates, you mean that it fills the area with sound through vibrations. The result is a full, clear and deep sound for a long time.

In the meaning of filling a place with sound, both reverberate and resonate can be used, other than that reverberate highlights more the meaning of reflection while resonating highlights sounds in harmony and sound which become louder through vibration.

Therefore, when a sound reverberates in a room, it also resonates.

Here are example sentences using resonate

• The siren resonated throughout the city.
• The singing resonated throughout the stadium.
• The books on top of the piano resonate when he plays.

Reverberant describes something - mostly a material, medium or a place - that can reflect sounds. Here are example sentences:

• Sound levels in a highly reverberant room can be considerably higher.
• The air is reverberant because sounds could be heard to a great distance.
• Cavernous places like gyms are reverberant.

The noun “reverberation” can mean the echo of a sound. For example:

• When you bang on a big piece of metal, you can hear the reverberation even after you stop hitting it. ( Here you can replace reverberation with echo)

Reverberation can also mean the process of reverberating as in the following examples

• Low reverberation plays an important role in good acoustics.
• This wall absorbs the sound and prevents reverberation.

Definition: The entire range of wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation

Example sentences:

• Light, the diet of eyes, constitutes a tiny part of the entire spectrum of electromagnetic radiation

Definition: (Of electromagnetic radiation) having a wavelength shorter than that of the violet end of the visible spectrum but longer than that of X-rays

Example sentences:

• Most medical lasers emit light which are either ultraviolet, infrared or in the visible spectrum of light.

Definition: speed

Example sentences:

• If an object is moving in one direction without a force acting on it, then it continues to move in that direction with a constant velocity.

Definition: lively; full of action; bright

Example sentences:

• Music, rhythm and dance are the beating heart of two vibrant exhibitions in Paris.
• Her vibrant personality made her well liked by everyone.

Definition: Move continuously and rapidly to and from

Example sentences:

• Neils Bohr's model of the atom, set forth in a series of papers in 1913, described atoms as constantly in motion, continuously vibrating, and moving. In conventional superconductors, vibrations of atoms induce electrons, which normally repel each other, to form pairs

Definition: An oscillation of the parts of a fluid or an elastic solid whose equilibrium has been disturbed or of an electromagnetic wave

Example sentences:

• In conventional superconductors, vibrations of atoms induce electrons, which normally repel each other, to form pairs

Definition: An electromotive force or potential difference expressed in volts

Example sentences:

• The plasma screen consists of tiny gas plasma cells that are charged at exact electrical voltages to make a picture. Then measure the voltage and current by attaching your volt meter to the two pieces of metal.

Definition: The distance between successive crests of a wave, especially points in a sound wave or electromagnetic wave:

Example sentences:

• Unfortunately, Earth's atmosphere blocks almost all wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum. The most powerful telescopes in the world, spanning all wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum, were retooled and reprogrammed to observe the dying star. Visible light consists of a ‘rainbow’ or spectrum of electromagnetic waves of different wavelengths.