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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
grating
I.noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ A grating is a set of tight and dark stripes, usually of equal width.
▪ A spectrograph uses optical elements called gratings or prisms to separate the light gathered by a telescope into its component colors.
▪ Gullies often become blocked by dead leaves and small stones which fall through the grating.
▪ Only a trail of blue sticky stuff all on the gratings.
▪ Sometimes I added a few gratings of nutmeg.
▪ Such patterns are known as gratings.
▪ This process forms gratings in the crystal, a record of the interference pattern.
▪ Those that had iron gratings locked them across the plate glass.
II.adjective
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ a grating personality
▪ a grating voice
▪ The machine began to spin faster and faster, with the grating screech of metal on metal.
▪ We could hear a group of tourists, talking in loud grating voices.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Calls a short high-pitched whistle and a harsh grating note.
▪ Rincewind tried to shut his ears to the grating voice beside him.
▪ The gangplank that linked the slipway to the boat shifted to and fro with a grating sound.
▪ The luminance profile of a typical grating pattern is shown in Figure 4.3.
▪ The statue slowly slithered off his body; a grating noise as it hit the floor.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Grating

Grate \Grate\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Grated; p. pr. & vb. n. Grating.] To furnish with grates; to protect with a grating or crossbars; as, to grate a window.

Grating

Grating \Grat"ing\, n. [See 2d Grate.]

  1. A partition, covering, or frame of parallel or cross bars; a latticework resembling a window grate; as, the grating of a prison or convent.

  2. (Optics) A system of close equidistant parallel lines or bars, esp. lines ruled on a polished surface, used for producing spectra by diffraction; -- called also diffraction grating.

    Note: Gratings have been made with over 40,000 such lines to the inch, but those with a somewhat smaller number give the best definition. They are used, e. g., to produce monochromatic light for use in optical instruments such as spectrophotometers.

  3. pl. (Naut.) The strong wooden lattice used to cover a hatch, admitting light and air; also, a movable Lattice used for the flooring of boats.

Grating

Grating \Grat"ing\, a. [See Grate to rub harshy.] That grates; making a harsh sound; harsh. -- Grat"ing*ly, adv.

Grating

Grating \Grat"ing\, n. A harsh sound caused by attrition.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
grating

"annoying, irritating," 1560s, figurative use of present participle adjective from grate (v.).

Wiktionary
grating
  1. 1 (typically of a voice) harsh and unpleasant 2 abrasive; tending to annoy n. 1 A barrier that has parallel or crossed bars blocking a passage but admitting air. 2 A frame of iron bars to hold a fire. 3 The loose material that comes from something being grated. 4 An optical system of close equidistant and parallel lines or bars, especially lines ruled on a polished surface, used for producing spectrum by diffraction. 5 (context nautical in the plural English) The strong wooden lattice used to cover a hatch, admitting light and air; also, a movable lattice used for the flooring of boats. v

  2. (present participle of grate English)

WordNet
grating

adj. unpleasantly harsh or grating in sound; "a gravelly voice" [syn: gravel, gravelly, rasping, raspy, rough]

grating
  1. n. a barrier that has parallel or crossed bars blocking a passage but admitting air [syn: grate]

  2. a frame of iron bars to hold a fire [syn: grate]

  3. optical device consisting of a surface with many parallel grooves in it; disperses a beam of light (or other electromagnetic radiation) into its wavelengths to produce its spectrum [syn: diffraction grating]

Wikipedia
Grating

A grating is any regularly spaced collection of essentially identical, parallel, elongated elements. Gratings usually consist of a single set of elongated elements, but can consist of two sets, in which case the second set is usually perpendicular to the first (as illustrated). When the two sets are perpendicular, this is also known as a grid or a mesh.

Usage examples of "grating".

She leaned forward, caught at a backstay, and snatched her legs from the water in a final spasm of terror before swivelling round and rolling over on to the cockpit grating deck.

When he looked at Beaumont again he saw that he was standing very stiff and straight on the gratings.

I only went to the parlour of the lazaretto, where, placed behind a grating, you can speak to any person who calls, and who must stand behind another grating placed opposite, at a distance of six feet.

They would have to squat or lie on the grating and lean downward to nail the cleats across the canvas.

The timbre of his voice was harsh and grating, yet it was a very interesting, even a seductive, voice, and, Domini thought, peculiarly full of vivid life, though not of energy.

The sense of loneliness and peace was profound, and as the rare windows of the houses, minute and protected by heavy gratings, were dark, it had seemed to Domini at first as if all the inhabitants were in bed and asleep.

Darwin speaks of the hissing of certain snakes, the rattle of the rattle-snake, the grating of the scales of the echis, each of which serves to frighten or terrify the enemy.

Working together, with hands extended through the grating, Theseus and Daedalus turned the log endwise and pulled it through, a process delayed by the necessity of hacking off one more branch.

It was a resonating, loud, grating voice, obviously from someone with an im-m ense chest, and something told Wind Made by Wings, even while his whole body and soul were concentrated in combat, that this -was the voice of the Alengwyneh king himself.

Sacro Monte the tableaux are produced in perpetuity, only the figures are not living, they are terra-cotta statues painted and moulded in so life-like a way that you feel that, were a man of flesh and blood to get mixed up with the crowd behind the grating, you would have hard work to distinguish him from the figures that have never had life.

We were shewn into a small parlour, and a few minutes afterwards a nun came in, went straight to the grating, touched a spring, and made four squares of the grating revolve, which left an opening sufficiently large to enable the two friends to embrace the ingenious window was afterwards carefully closed.

I was certain that my two friends would be behind the grating, and that it would afford me the pleasant opportunity of seeing them together and of comparing them.

After I had examined the Pantaloons, Punches, Harlequins, and Merry Andrews, I went near the grating, where I saw all the nuns and boarders, some seated, some standing, and, without appearing to, notice any of them in particular, I remarked my two friends together, and very intent upon the dancers.

Dried, ground ginger is no substitute, and for this reason I have long kept a gingerroot in a zipper-lock bag in my freezer, ever-ready for grating or mincing.

Arthur saw Ichabod slide past, till the Denizen managed to grab hold of a grating.