screen
Meanings
- A physical divider intended to block an area from view, or provide shelter from something dangerous.
- A material woven from fine wires intended to block animals or large particles from passing while allowing gasses, liquids and finer particles to pass.
- A frame supporting a mesh of bars or wires used to classify fragments of stone by size, allowing the passage of fragments whose a diameter is smaller than the distance between the bars or wires.
- The protective netting which protects the audience from flying objects
- A stencil upon a framed mesh through which paint is forced onto printed-on material; the frame with the mesh itself.
- Searching through a sample for a target; an act of screening, or the method for it.
- A technique used to identify genes so as to study gene functions.
- Various forms or formats of information display
- The viewing surface or area of a movie, or moving picture or slide presentation.
- A room in a cinema.
- The informational viewing area of electronic devices, where output is displayed.
- One of the individual regions of a video game, etc. divided into separate screens.
- To filter by passing through a screen.
- To filter.
- To shelter or conceal.
- To remove information, or censor intellectual material from viewing. To hide the facts.
- To present publicly (on the screen).
- To fit with a screen.
- To examine patients or treat a sample in order to detect a chemical or a disease, or to assess susceptibility to a disease.
- To search chemical libraries by means of a computational technique in order to identify chemical compounds which would potentially bind to a given biological target such as a protein.
- To stand so as to block a defender from reaching a teammate.
- To determine the source or subject matter of a call before deciding whether to answer the phone.
- A surname.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English scren, screne (“windscreen, firescreen”), from Anglo-Norman escren (“firescreen, the tester of a bed”), Old French escren, escrein, escran (modern French écran (“screen”)), from Middle Dutch scherm, from Old Dutch skirm, from Proto-West Germanic *skirmi, from Proto-Germanic *skirmiz (“fur, shelter, covering, screen”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut, divide”). Cognate with Dutch scherm (“screen”), German Schirm (“screen”). Doublet of scherm. An alternative etymology derives Old French escren, escran from Old Dutch *scranc (“barrier”) (compare Middle Dutch schranc, schranke (“palisade, trellis, grid”), German Schrank (“cupboard, cabinet”), German Schranke (“fence”)), from Proto-West Germanic *skrank, from Proto-Germanic *skrankaz.