What's the difference between collapse and contraction?

Collapse


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To fall together suddenly, as the sides of a hollow vessel; to close by falling or shrinking together; to have the sides or parts of (a thing) fall in together, or be crushed in together; as, a flue in the boiler of a steam engine sometimes collapses.
  • (v. i.) To fail suddenly and completely, like something hollow when subject to too much pressure; to undergo a collapse; as, Maximilian's government collapsed soon after the French army left Mexico; many financial projects collapse after attaining some success and importance.
  • (n.) A falling together suddenly, as of the sides of a hollow vessel.
  • (n.) A sudden and complete failure; an utter failure of any kind; a breakdown.
  • (n.) Extreme depression or sudden failing of all the vital powers, as the result of disease, injury, or nervous disturbance.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) As collapse was imminent, MAP increased but CO and TPR did not change significantly.
  • (2) Video games specialist Game was teetering on the brink of collapse on Friday after a rescue deal put forward by private equity firm OpCapita appeared to have been given the cold shoulder by lenders who are owed more than £100m.
  • (3) Meeting after meeting during 2011 to try to hammer out agreements about the basic shape of the Egyptian constitution – meetings that always mysteriously collapsed.
  • (4) Poor workplace health and safety, inadequate toilet facilities and dangerous fumes from mosquito fogging that led to one asylum seeker with asthma collapsing were all raised as concerns by Kilburn, although he stressed that he believed G4S management and expatriate G4S staff acted appropriately.
  • (5) The ATPase inhibitor dicyclohexylcarbodiimide, which collapsed the chemical and electrical components of the proton motive force, caused rapid cell swelling in the presence of glucose (and high intracellular ATP levels).
  • (6) Cobra collapsed into administration in 2009 after which Lord Bilimoria was criticised for using a “pre-pack” deal to buy back a stake in the firm.
  • (7) For the next three years, Foxtons suffered collapsing sales and staff culls.
  • (8) Sometimes it can seem as if the history of the City is the history of its crises and disasters, from the banking crisis of 1825 (which saw undercapitalised banks collapse – perhaps the closest historic parallel to the contemporary credit crunch), through the Spanish panic of 1835, the railway bust of 1837, the crash of Overend Gurney, the Kaffir boom, the Westralian boom, the Marconi scandal, and so on and on – a theme with endless variations.
  • (9) The Rio+ 20 Earth summit could collapse after countries failed to agree on acceptable language just two weeks before 120 world leaders arrive at the biggest UN summit ever organised, WWF warned on Wednesday.
  • (10) Dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCCD) inhibits this carrier in a time- and concentration -dependent manner as shown by the following evidence: it inhibits the carrier-mediated pH gradient driven monoamine uptake without collapsing the pH gradient; it affects the binding of the specific inhibitors [2-3H]dihydrotetrabenazine and [3H]reserpine.
  • (11) After completion of the hepatectomy, he developed circulatory collapse of unknown cause and died shortly after the operation.
  • (12) Secularism is the only way to stop collapse and chaos and to foster bonds of citizenship in our complex democracy.
  • (13) In such cases, hypertension must be controlled with phentolamine or sodium nitroprusside, cardiac arrhythmia with lignocaine, and collapse with volaemic expansion.
  • (14) Two conditions must be fulfilled: a lesion of a non collapsible vein; and a pressure gradient from outside to inside the vein, as occurs for instance during puncture of a large vein in a hypovolemic patient.
  • (15) Gastroduodenal investigation must of course be comprised of pictures during collapse, semi-collapse and repletion of the entire duodenal outline; once out of every two times, one has to recourse to intravenous duodenography which has become a routine investigation.
  • (16) When communism collapsed at the end of the 1980s and the sledgehammers started to thud into the Berlin Wall, the future for laissez-faire economics was brighter than it had been since 1914.
  • (17) Emergency teams are still working to reconnect 10,000 households in northern England which lost power in blizzards and gales, after all-night repairs on collapsed cables which left 80,000 cut off.
  • (18) In 4 persons the test had to be stopped because of collapse.
  • (19) Peacocks , the budget fashion chain, has fallen into administration, putting 9,600 jobs at risk, after a management buyout deal collapsed at the last minute.
  • (20) Nuclear pyknosis was seen in cortical cells of animals dying in collapse.

Contraction


Definition:

  • (n.) The act or process of contracting, shortening, or shrinking; the state of being contracted; as, contraction of the heart, of the pupil of the eye, or of a tendion; the contraction produced by cold.
  • (n.) The process of shortening an operation.
  • (n.) The act of incurring or becoming subject to, as liabilities, obligation, debts, etc.; the process of becoming subject to; as, the contraction of a disease.
  • (n.) Something contracted or abbreviated, as a word or phrase; -- as, plenipo for plenipotentiary; crim. con. for criminal conversation, etc.
  • (n.) The shortening of a word, or of two words, by the omission of a letter or letters, or by reducing two or more vowels or syllables to one; as, ne'er for never; can't for can not; don't for do not; it's for it is.
  • (n.) A marriage contract.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) During the performance of propulsive waves of the oesophagus the implanted vagus nerve caused clonic to tetanic contractions of the sternohyoid muscle, thus proving the oesophagomotor genesis of the reinnervating nerve fibres.
  • (2) But RWE admitted it had often only been able to retain customers with expired contracts by offering them new deals with more favourable conditions.
  • (3) Thus adrenaline, via pre- and post-junctional adrenoceptors, may contribute to enhanced vascular smooth muscle contraction, which most likely is sensitized by the elevated intracellular calcium concentration.
  • (4) Further, the maximal increase in force of contraction was measured using papillary muscle strips from some of these patients.
  • (5) When subjects centered themselves actively, or additionally, contracted trunk flexor or extensor muscles to predetermined levels of activity, no increase in trunk positioning accuracy was found.
  • (6) Twitch-tetanus ratios were calculated and found not to be related to unit contraction time.6.
  • (7) Selective removal of endothelium had no effect on BK-induced contraction or the action of the antagonists.
  • (8) The increased muscular strength in due to a rise of calcaemia, improved muscle contraction and probably also due to the mentioned nutritional factors.
  • (9) However, there was not a relationship between the contraction curve of the gallbladder and the bile flow into the duodenum.
  • (10) In in vitro preparations GABA (10(-7) - 10(-3) M) elicited a dose-dependent relaxation; a decrease in the spontaneous contractions was sometimes observed.
  • (11) There was no correlation between disturbed gastric clearance, impaired gall bladder contraction, and prolonged colonic transit time in the patients with cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy nor was there a correlation between any disturbed motor function and age or duration of diabetes.
  • (12) Noradrenaline decreased the phasic contraction amplitude of the circular muscle and exerted a stimulant effect on the tone which suggested an existence of two alpha 1-adrenoceptor subtypes.
  • (13) It may, however, be useful to compare local wall dynamics in the more isometrically-contracting basal segment with those in the middle portion which brings about most of the emptying of the ventricle.
  • (14) Upon depletion of ATP in contraction, the P2 intensity reverted to the original rigor level, accompanied by development of rigor tension.
  • (15) L-NAME abolished B contractions in a dose-dependent fashion.
  • (16) The power spectrum of the EMG was analyzed during isometric contractions of the shoulder muscles.
  • (17) A23187 had only a transient effect on KCl-contracted coronary arteries.
  • (18) When caffeine evokes a contraction, and only then, crayfish muscle fibers become refractory to a second challenge with caffeine for up to 20 min in the standard saline (5 mM K(o)).
  • (19) Dopamine at concentrations over 10(-5)M induced contractions of tracheal muscle strips and repeated exposures resulted in desensitization (tachyphylaxis) of the muscle.
  • (20) In the present study we examined cholecystokinin release and gallbladder contraction after oral administration of a commercial fatty meal (Sorbitract; Dagra, Diemen, The Netherlands) using ultrasonography in eight normal subjects and eight gallstone patients before and after 1 and 4 weeks of treatment with ursodeoxycholic acid (10 mg kg-1.day-1).