collimate means to focus into a narrow beam or column; to adjust a focusing device so that it produces a narrow beam. It carries an Arena rating of 1594, earned across 3 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, collimate ranks #317 of 17,142 for Most Ingenious Words, #1,658 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #2,361 of 17,151 for The Improbable, #2,488 of 17,132 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound.
collimate is pronounced /ˈkɒlɪmeɪt/.
Why “collimate” is a great word
To adjust an optical device so that light rays or other emissions are made parallel, forming a narrow beam. From a 17th-century misreading of Latin *collineāre* ("to direct in a straight line") as *collīmāre*, giving the past participle *collīmātus*, which entered English as *collimate*, first attested in 1623. Unlike "focus," which converges rays to a singular point, or "align," a broader act of spatial arrangement, to collimate is the precise optical art of enforcing perfect parallelism. It is the act of taking a star’s scattered gleam and forging it into a lance of pure direction, of tuning the chaotic whisper of a laser into a silent, needle-thin line, of giving a diffuse intention the discipline of a single, unbending path—the human urge to correct nature’s straying and impose a strict geometry upon light.
Etymology
First attested in 1623; borrowed from Latin collimātus, perfect passive participle of collīmō (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), itself originating from a misreading of collīniō, collīneō.
verb
- To focus into a narrow beam or column; to adjust a focusing device so that it produces a narrow beam.e.g.“Lead bricks were placed around the radioactive source so that the escaping gamma rays would be limited to a collimated beam rather than filling the lab.”
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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