| Library / English Dictionary |
TERRAIN
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A piece of ground having specific characteristics or military potential
Example:
they decided to attack across the rocky terrain
Classified under:
Nouns denoting spatial position
Hypernyms ("terrain" is a kind of...):
parcel; parcel of land; piece of ground; piece of land; tract (an extended area of land)
Context examples:
The floors and terrain between craters show signs of water ice, colored in blue.
(Pluto’s ‘Halo’ Craters, NASA)
Some of these troughs have darker material within them, while others are traced by clumps of hills that appear to rise above the surrounding terrain.
(New Horizons Discovers Frozen Plains in the Heart of Pluto’s ‘Heart’, NASA)
A newly discovered mountain range lies near the southwestern margin of Pluto’s Tombaugh Regio (Tombaugh Region), situated between bright, icy plains and dark, heavily-cratered terrain.
(New Horizons Finds Second Mountain Range in Pluto’s ‘Heart’, NASA)
Running low on fuel, Commander Neil Armstrong only had a few minutes to find a suitable spot to land, but he was finding only rocky terrain that was inappropriate to settle down on.
(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)
Large bodies composed of biotite granite, such as the Wyoming batholith, are more common in the Neoarchean era (2.8 billion-2.5 billion years ago) than in younger terrains.
(Supervolcanoes like Yellowstone may have been more active in the past, NSF)
It therefore found in a wide variety of habitats: volcanic terrains, lava-strewn coasts, and clearings or limestone outcrops.
(Morinda citrifolia, NCI Thesaurus)
A new analysis of data from two lunar missions finds evidence that the Moon’s water is widely distributed across the surface and is not confined to a particular region or type of terrain.
(On Second Thought, the Moon's Water May Be Widespread and Immobile, NASA)
However, the valley is not only the product of two large, parallel, fault scarps—the elevation of the valley floor is below that of the surrounding terrain, suggesting that another process may be at work.
(‘Great Valley’ Found on Mercury, NASA)
This slight deviation causes the point on Mimas' surface that faces Saturn to vary a bit over the course of an orbit — an observer on Saturn would see Mimas wobble slightly during its orbit, causing small amounts of terrain over the limb to become visible.
(Saturn Moon May Hide a 'Fossil' Core or an Ocean, NASA)
Under Hamilton’s scenario, the ice cap may have been heavy enough to sink a few miles or kilometers into Pluto’s crust, which could explain why Sputnik Planitia is lower than the surrounding terrain.
(Scientists Probe Mystery of Pluto’s Icy Heart, NASA)
