Library / English Dictionary

DETECT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Discover or determine the existence, presence, or fact of

Example:

We found traces of lead in the paint

Synonyms:

detect; discover; find; notice; observe

Classified under:

Verbs of seeing, hearing, feeling

Hypernyms (to "detect" is one way to...):

sight; spy (catch sight of; to perceive with the eyes)

Verb group:

discover; find (make a discovery, make a new finding)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "detect"):

catch out; find out (trap; especially in an error or in a reprehensible act)

sense (detect some circumstance or entity automatically)

instantiate (find an instance of (a word or particular usage of a word))

trace (discover traces of)

see (observe as if with an eye)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s that CLAUSE

Derivation:

detecting (a police investigation to determine the perpetrator)

detection (the act of detecting something; catching sight of something)

detector (any device that receives a signal or stimulus (as heat or pressure or light or motion etc.) and responds to it in a distinctive manner)

detector (electronic equipment that detects the presence of radio signals or radioactivity)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Despite being less accurate than scientific-grade equipment, the GPS (Global Positioning System) receivers in a smartphone can detect the permanent ground movement (displacement) caused by fault motion in a large earthquake.

(Crowdsourced Smartphone Data Could Give Advance Notice for People in Quake Zones, JPL)

The device called FINDER (Finding Individuals for Disaster and Emergency Response) uses microwave-radar technology to detect heartbeats of victims trapped in wreckage.

(DHS and NASA Technology Helps Save Four in Nepal Earthquake Disaster, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Doctors use imaging tests to detect them.

(Arteriovenous Malformations, NIH: National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke)

Skin abscesses are easy to detect.

(Abscess, NIH)

A test used to detect some types of hearing loss, such as hearing loss caused by injury or tumors that affect nerves involved in hearing.

(ABR test, NCI Dictionary)

It is used as a biomarker to detect damage to the kidneys caused by drugs and other agents.

(AAP, NCI Dictionary)

In normal tissues, this mRNA is expressed only in testis, whereas it is detected in a range of different tumor types such as bladder, breast, lung, liver, and colon.

(Acrosin Binding Protein, NCI Thesaurus/LocusLink)

No tests are available to detect adhesions.

(Adhesions, NIH: National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases)

These abnormal cells are found in a small number of Pap smears (a procedure used to detect cervical cancer) and may be a sign of more serious lesions or cancer.

(AGUS, NCI Dictionary)

A drug containing a form of radioactive iodine called I 123 that is used to detect certain types of tumors, including pheochromocytomas and neuroblastomas.

(AdreView, NCI Dictionary)