Crossword clues for inflect
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Inflect \In*flect"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Inflected; p. pr. & vb. n. Inflecting.] [L. inflectere, inflexum; pref. in- in + flectere to bend. See Flexible, and cf. Inflex.]
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To turn from a direct line or course; to bend; to incline, to deflect; to curve; to bow.
Are they [the rays of the sun] not reflected, refracted, and inflected by one and the same principle ?
--Sir I. Newton. (Gram.) To vary, as a noun or a verb in its terminations; to decline, as a noun or adjective, or to conjugate, as a verb.
To modulate, as the voice.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
early 15c., "to bend inward," from Latin inflectere (past participle inflexus) "to bend in, bow, curve," figuratively, "to change," from in- "in" (see in- (1)) + flectere "to bend" (see flexible). Grammatical sense is attested 1660s; pronunciation sense (in inflection) is c.1600. Related: Inflected; inflecting.
Wiktionary
vb. 1 (context transitive English) To cause to curve inwards. 2 (context transitive music English) To change the tone or pitch of the voice when speaking or singing. 3 (context transitive grammar English) To vary the form of a word to express tense, gender, number, mood, etc.
WordNet
Usage examples of "inflect".
They were Muslims, though one could scarcely have known it from their speech, which was Russian, though inflected with the singsong Azerbaijani accent that wrongly struck the senior members of the engineering staff as entertaining.
A piece of leaf immersed in a few drops of a solution of one part of carbonate of ammonia to 437 of water had all the glands blackened and all the tentacles inflected in 5 m.
If the tentacles of a young, yet fully matured leaf, that has never been excited or become inflected, be examined, the cells forming the pedicels are seen to be filled with homogeneous, purple fluid.
I have indeed tried hundreds of times the state of the secretion on the discs of leaves which were inflected over various objects, and never failed to find it acid.
Small portions placed on the discs of three leaves caused their tentacles and blades to be strongly inflected within 8 hrs.
Halfminims of a solution of one part to 437 of water were placed on the discs of three leaves and acted most energetically, causing the tentacles of one to be inflected in 15 m.
It is a much more remarkable fact that when an object, such as a bit of meat or an insect, is placed on the disc of a leaf, as soon as the surrounding tentacles become considerably inflected, their glands pour forth an increased amount of secretion.
As soon as tentacles, which have remained closely inflected during several days over an object, begin to reexpand, their glands secrete less freely, or cease to secrete, and are left dry.
Fortyfour leaves had from one to six tentacles inflected, generally the longheaded ones.
This was likewise the case with the short tentacles round the margins of the disc, which had not as yet become inflected.
Those monkeys had been inflected with simian fever and would have died anyway.
The length of time during which the tentacles remain inflected largely depends on the quantity of the substance given, partly on the facility with which it is penetrated or acted on by the secretion, and partly on its essential nature.
As it was immediately evident that these fluids produced a great effect, I neglected in most cases to record how soon the tentacles became inflected.
When however a leaf becomes quickly inflected in water, as sometimes happens, especially during very warm weather, aggregation may occur in little over 1 hr. In all cases leaves left in water for more than 24 hrs.
A little drop of the same size and strength was also applied to four other glands, and in 1 hr. two became inflected, whilst the other two never moved.