(n.) An instrument by means of which the bolt of a lock is shot or drawn; usually, a removable metal instrument fitted to the mechanism of a particular lock and operated by turning in its place.
(n.) An instrument which is turned like a key in fastening or adjusting any mechanism; as, a watch key; a bed key, etc.
(n.) That part of an instrument or machine which serves as the means of operating it; as, a telegraph key; the keys of a pianoforte, or of a typewriter.
(n.) A position or condition which affords entrance, control, pr possession, etc.; as, the key of a line of defense; the key of a country; the key of a political situation. Hence, that which serves to unlock, open, discover, or solve something unknown or difficult; as, the key to a riddle; the key to a problem.
(n.) That part of a mechanism which serves to lock up, make fast, or adjust to position.
(n.) A piece of wood used as a wedge.
(n.) The last board of a floor when laid down.
(n.) A keystone.
(n.) That part of the plastering which is forced through between the laths and holds the rest in place.
(n.) A wedge to unite two or more pieces, or adjust their relative position; a cotter; a forelock.
(n.) A bar, pin or wedge, to secure a crank, pulley, coupling, etc., upon a shaft, and prevent relative turning; sometimes holding by friction alone, but more frequently by its resistance to shearing, being usually embedded partly in the shaft and partly in the crank, pulley, etc.
(n.) An indehiscent, one-seeded fruit furnished with a wing, as the fruit of the ash and maple; a samara; -- called also key fruit.
(n.) A family of tones whose regular members are called diatonic tones, and named key tone (or tonic) or one (or eight), mediant or three, dominant or five, subdominant or four, submediant or six, supertonic or two, and subtonic or seven. Chromatic tones are temporary members of a key, under such names as " sharp four," "flat seven," etc. Scales and tunes of every variety are made from the tones of a key.
(n.) The fundamental tone of a movement to which its modulations are referred, and with which it generally begins and ends; keynote.
(n.) Fig: The general pitch or tone of a sentence or utterance.
(v. t.) To fasten or secure firmly; to fasten or tighten with keys or wedges.
Example Sentences:
(1) Community involvement is a key element of the Primary Health Care (PHC) approach, and thus an essential topic on a course for managers of Primary Health Care programmes.
(2) A key way of regaining public trust will be reforming the system of remuneration as agreed by the G20.
(3) Instead, the White House opted for a low-key approach, publishing a blogpost profiling Trinace Edwards, a brain-tumour victim who recently discovered she was eligible for Medicaid coverage.
(4) The presence of a few key residues in the amino-terminal alpha-helix of each ligand is sufficient to confer specificity to the interaction.
(5) The key warning from the Fed chair A summary of Bernanke's hearing Earlier... MPs in London quizzed the Bank of England on Libor.
(6) "Seller reports are key to identifying bad buyers and ridding them from our marketplace," says eBay.
(7) It is suggested that the low-density lipoprotein receptors in human fetal liver may play a key role in the regulation of the serum cholesterol levels during gestation.
(8) A key component of a career program should be recognition of a nurse's needs and the program should be evaluated to determine if these needs are met.
(9) As novel antibody therapeutics are developed for different malignancies and require evaluation with cells previously uncharacterized as antibody-dependent cell-mediated cytotoxicity (ADCC) targets, efficient description of key parameters of the assay system expedites the preclinical assessment.
(10) Meanwhile, Hunt has been accused of backtracking on a key recommendation in the official report into Mid Staffs.
(11) The safe motherhood initiative demands an intersectoral, collaborative approach to gynecology, family planning, and child health in which midwifery is the key element.
(12) Acetylcholinesterase is a key enzyme in cholinergic neurotransmission for hydrolyzing acetylcholine and has been shown to possess arylacylamidase activity in addition to esterase activity.
(13) If Lagarde had been placed under formal investigation in the Tapie case, it would have risked weakening her position and further embarrassing both the IMF and France by heaping more judicial worries on a key figure on the international stage.
(14) Four goals, four assists, and constant movement have been a key part of the team’s success.
(15) Mechanosensitive ion channels may play a key role in transducing vascular smooth muscle (VSM) stretch into active force development.
(16) But Abaaoud, the man thought to be a key planner for the group behind the Paris attacks, boasted to a niece that he had brought around 90 militants back to Europe with him.
(17) Key therapeutic questions are whether beta-lactams can safely replace aminoglycosides for the treatment of gram-negative pneumonia, and whether monotherapy or aminoglycoside and beta-lactam combination antibiotic treatment is superior.
(18) Teaching procedures then establish and build these key components to fluency.
(19) Doubts about Hinkley Point have deepened after a detailed report by HSBC’s energy analysts described eight key challenges to the project, which will be built by the state-backed French firm EDF and be part-financed by investment from China .
(20) The Lords will vote on three key amendments: • To exclude child benefit from the cap calculation (this would roughly halve the number of households affected).
Scratch
Definition:
(v. t.) To rub and tear or mark the surface of with something sharp or ragged; to scrape, roughen, or wound slightly by drawing something pointed or rough across, as the claws, the nails, a pin, or the like.
(v. t.) To write or draw hastily or awkwardly.
(v. t.) To cancel by drawing one or more lines through, as the name of a candidate upon a ballot, or of a horse in a list; hence, to erase; to efface; -- often with out.
(v. t.) To dig or excavate with the claws; as, some animals scratch holes, in which they burrow.
(v. i.) To use the claws or nails in tearing or in digging; to make scratches.
(v. i.) To score, not by skillful play but by some fortunate chance of the game.
(n.) A break in the surface of a thing made by scratching, or by rubbing with anything pointed or rough; a slight wound, mark, furrow, or incision.
(n.) A line across the prize ring; up to which boxers are brought when they join fight; hence, test, trial, or proof of courage; as, to bring to the scratch; to come up to the scratch.
(n.) Minute, but tender and troublesome, excoriations, covered with scabs, upon the heels of horses which have been used where it is very wet or muddy.
(n.) A kind of wig covering only a portion of the head.
(n.) A shot which scores by chance and not as intended by the player; a fluke.
(a.) Made, done, or happening by chance; arranged with little or no preparation; determined by circumstances; haphazard; as, a scratch team; a scratch crew for a boat race; a scratch shot in billiards.
Example Sentences:
(1) To test the hypothesis that EAA agonists are involved in transmission of nociceptive information in the spinal cord, we tested the effect of various opioid, sigma and phencyclidine compounds on the action of NMDA in the tail-flick, hot-plate and biting and scratching nociceptive tests.
(2) Some organization schemes concerning locomotor and scratching rhythmicity generators are considered, such as: two half-centres with reciprocal inhibitory connections and tonic excitatory influences on these half-centres: two half-centres with inhibitory-excitatory connections and tonic excitatory influences on one half-centre; ring structures consisting of more than two functional groups of neurons with excitatory and inhibitory connections between them.
(3) In an interview with the Guardian, James Hansen, the world's pre-eminent climate scientist, said any agreement likely to emerge from the negotiations would be so deeply flawed that it would be better to start again from scratch.
(4) The satisfaction derived from smoking depends not only on the pharmacological effects of nicotine but also the sensory stimulation from smoke inhalation, particularly the tracheal 'scratch'.
(5) The pathogenesis of the prolific mite population is unclear, but either a specific immunologic deficit or the inability to effectively eliminate the mites by scratching is a plausible possibility.
(6) Forty-three percent of dog bites, and 52% of cat bites-scratches were provoked, that is, happened while the victim was interacting with the animal.
(7) If the NHS was being created from scratch, primary and community care would be treated as one service.
(8) The timing of knee extensor activity within the hip cycle is different for each form of the scratch (Robertson et al., 1985); thus, the sign of the reset cannot be predicted from the timing of the stimulus relative to the knee extensor cycle.
(9) We report a patient with cat scratch disease who presented with multiple scattered nodular lesions on the legs.
(10) Application of APV to a midbody segment also reduced the magnitude of temporal summation in the scratch circuit in response to electrical stimuli delivered to the shell at 4- to 5-s intervals.
(11) Windshields, spectacles, contact lenses, lashes, an excessive tear meniscus, intraocular lens scratches, and posterior capsular opacification are possible causes that can be easily identified and treated.
(12) Ventral UVA pre-exposure did not appear to affect dorsal skin irritation as expressed by scratch marks.
(13) A rare vascular proliferation found as a skin lesion in patients suffering from the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome and sometimes referred to as epithelioid angiomatosis is believed to be a manifestation of infection by the cat scratch bacillus or a related organism.
(14) We have made Afghanistan stronger by building up from scratch strong security forces.
(15) Immunoperoxidase staining with an antiserum raised against the cat-scratch disease bacillus stained these organisms in all patients.
(16) licking, scratching, grooming, head and limb movements), a reaction termed immobility.
(17) These data suggest that hindlimb scratching induced by 5-HT agonists may not be centrally mediated but rather may be mediated by a neuronal 5-HT1A receptor localized outside the blood-brain barrier.
(18) In contrast, after weaning they showed a significant increment in the duration of face-washing, head-washing, fur licking and body-scratching.
(19) A strong correlation was found between reduction in scratching and improvement in skin status.
(20) But screens already demonstrated by GT can withstand scratches from concrete.