What's the difference between barely and subtle?

Barely


Definition:

  • (adv.) Without covering; nakedly.
  • (adv.) Without concealment or disguise.
  • (adv.) Merely; only.
  • (adv.) But just; without any excess; with nothing to spare ( of quantity, time, etc.); hence, scarcely; hardly; as, there was barely enough for all; he barely escaped.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Environment groups Environment groups that have strongly backed low-carbon power have barely wavered in their opposition to nuclear in the last decade, although their arguments now are now much about the cost than the danger it might pose.
  • (2) Moderately differentiated tumor revealed a wider range of nucleus size, less clustering (coefficient--3.59) and more hyperchromatic (70.1%) and "bare" (49.4%) nuclei and large nucleoli (22.2%).
  • (3) Facebook Twitter Pinterest Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats have suffered a dramatic slump in support as a result of their role in the coalition and are now barely ahead of the Greens with an average rating of about 8% in the polls.
  • (4) At the bottom is a tiny harbour where cafe Itxas Etxea – bare brick walls and wraparound glass windows – is serving txakoli, the local white wine.
  • (5) Some antibodies and other proteins bind tightly to nitrocellulose and dissociation of these proteins by Tween 20 is barely detectable.
  • (6) In a barely-noticed submission to the government's Environmental Audit Committee, the London borough of Hounslow, the airport's near neighbours, said the airport was: breaching the World Health Organisation's guidelines for the levels for noise in people's bedrooms; breaching the EU guidelines for levels of nitrogen dioxide; and breaching British standards on the noise experienced by children in classrooms.
  • (7) For a writer barely out of his teens when it was published, in 1946, the book was an unusual achievement.
  • (8) Saving for a deposit is near impossible while paying extortionate rents for barely habitable flatshares.
  • (9) The relatively small reservoir and the maintenance of a minimum flow of water on the trunk river means the plant will work on average at barely 40% of its 11,200MW capacity.
  • (10) I have in the past predicted anger, as the consequences of the recession for public spending become clear; I think the process of expressing that anger has barely begun.
  • (11) She walks past stack after stack of books kept behind metal cages, the shelves barely visible in the dim light from the frosted-glass windows.
  • (12) Dual-positive CD4+CD8+ T cells (which were barely detectable in normal adults), CD4-CD8+ T cells and B cells transiently reached supranormal levels during recovery.
  • (13) But Sir Hayden Phillips's proposals are stalemated by Labour determination to cap spending and the Tory desire to cap Labour's unions funding while leaving their own flow of funds barely affected.
  • (14) In Golgi-Cox-impregnated coronal sections of albino rat brains at 1, 4, 26, 24, 30, 60 and 90 days it is presented the evolution of the spine-less, bare initial zone ("nude zone", NZ) at the proximal apical main dendrites of the layer V pyramidal neurons in the somatosensory and anterior limbie cortex.
  • (15) Average earnings are forecast to grow just 2.4% in 2017, meaning they will be barely rising in real terms.
  • (16) The police officers guarding the entrance to Japan's nuclear evacuation zone barely glance at Yukio Yamamoto's permit before waving him through.
  • (17) An additional 30 cm of clay covered the tailings on one plot and each plot was subdivided into bare soil and vegetated subplots.
  • (18) In order to avoid the drawbacks of the cutting end of the bare optic fibers, it may be covered with sapphire optics which conducts well laser energy.
  • (19) In addition the bare central backbone showed transverse striations.
  • (20) In a third experiment, rats were unilaterally gonadectomized and blood samples were obtained at various intervals for 48 h. Following unilateral gonadectomy there was a significant transient increase in FSH levels in male or female MSG-treated rats as compared to their 0 h values; however, the absolute levels attained were barely equal to the basal concentrations observed in the saline-treated control rats.

Subtle


Definition:

  • (superl.) Sly in design; artful; cunning; insinuating; subtile; -- applied to persons; as, a subtle foe.
  • (superl.) Cunningly devised; crafty; treacherous; as, a subtle stratagem.
  • (superl.) Characterized by refinement and niceness in drawing distinctions; nicely discriminating; -- said of persons; as, a subtle logician; refined; tenuous; sinuous; insinuating; hence, penetrative or pervasive; -- said of the mind; its faculties, or its operations; as, a subtle intellect; a subtle imagination; a subtle process of thought; also, difficult of apprehension; elusive.
  • (superl.) Smooth and deceptive.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) As a group, the three mammalian proteins resemble bovine serum conglutinin and behave as lectins with rather broad sugar specificities directed at certain non-reducing terminal N-acetylglucosamine, mannose, glucose and fucose residues, but with subtle differences in fine specificities.
  • (2) But it will be a subtle difference, because it's already abundantly clear there's no danger of the war being suddenly forgotten, or made to seem irrelevant to our sense of what Europe and the world has to avoid repeating.
  • (3) Communicating sustainability is a subtle attempt at doing good Read more And yet, in environmental terms it is infinitely preferable to prevent waste altogether, rather than recycle it.
  • (4) If, indeed, there is an immunologic basis for pre-eclampsia, it is more subtle than the methodology used in this study is capable of detecting.
  • (5) Subtle differences between Chicago urban and Grand Forks rural climates are reflected in arthritic subjects' degree of pain and their perception of pain-related stress.
  • (6) Critical in this understanding are the subtle changes that occur in the individual patient, reflecting the natural history of the disease or response to its treatment.
  • (7) Subtle cognitive deficits in Inferential Reading Comprehension were detected when Reading Vocabulary was at or better than a twelfth grade level.
  • (8) This histochemical difference corresponded to more subtle differences in Nissl and myelin staining patterns, and suggests further structural subdivisions of potential functional significance.
  • (9) Thus, luciferase transcriptional fusions can detect subtle variations in initial rates of gene expression in a real-time, nondestructive assay.
  • (10) The binding of [3H]PAF to washed human platelets indicated subtle changes between Days 2 and 4, which became more noticeable by Day 6.
  • (11) In this study the temperature dependence of the reactivity of aldolase SH groups is investigated in order to detect subtle changes in the enzyme conformation.
  • (12) The crucial issue of whether subtle behavioral, intellectual, and developmental impairment occurs in young children, as a result of lead-induced CNS damage is discussed in detail.
  • (13) Historically, what made SNL’s campaign coverage so necessary was its ability to highlight the subtle absurdities of the election and exaggerate the ridiculous.
  • (14) It is believed that by looking at such subtle shape differences an understanding of what it means morphologically for a primate to be either more or less arboreal may be achieved.
  • (15) The current magnetic resonance imaging system with computerized image processing is a sensitive and simple method for evaluation of subtle parenchymal changes of the brain.
  • (16) Fundus examination disclosed a subtle cherry red spot bilaterally.
  • (17) Ependymal cells developed luminal fronds that projected into the ventricle and the subpial glia displayed a very subtle gliosis in the form of thin multi-laminated processes.
  • (18) The rapidity of obtaining the results (within one hour), the complete absence of untoward reactions to the radiopharmaceuticals, the much lower frequency of subtle or indeterminate results, the ability to render useful information in the presence of moderate jaundice and the lack of interference from overlying intestinal contents establishes these radionuclide agents as superior to both radiographic oral and intravenous cholangiography in the investigation of the acute abdomen.
  • (19) Moreover, subtle improvements observed in earlier investigations were not confirmed.
  • (20) Various compounds show subtle but significant differences in blood clearance, excretion, and soft-tissue uptake.