Refract
verb
It is when light changes direction when it passes through a different medium or substance.
When light enters water or a prism, it refracts and gives us a rainbow.
Often appears as...
- refract light
- refract sunrays
verb
In Physics, it's the deviation of a wave when it passes obliquely from one medium into another in which its speed is different.
The prism refracted the light into a sequence of colors.
Often appears as...
- refract a wave
- refract a signal
Usage tips
Academic
verb
It is when light changes direction when it passes through a different medium or substance.
When light enters water or a prism, it refracts and gives us a rainbow.
Often appears as...
- refract light
- refract sunrays
verb
In Physics, it's the deviation of a wave when it passes obliquely from one medium into another in which its speed is different.
The prism refracted the light into a sequence of colors.
Often appears as...
- refract a wave
- refract a signal
Usage tips
Academic
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Medium Change
Refract is used when light crosses boundaries like air to water, altering its course.
The straw seems bent where it refracts at the water's surface.
Pro Tip 2/3Natural Phenomena
Use 'refract' to explain why we see beautiful patterns like rainbows in nature.
The droplets in the atmosphere refract sunlight to create a rainbow.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Reflection
'Refract' isn't the same as 'reflect.' It's about bending within, not bouncing back.
The light doesn't reflect off the water, it refracts within it.
Pro Tip 1/3Medium Change
Refract is used when light crosses boundaries like air to water, altering its course.
The straw seems bent where it refracts at the water's surface.
Pro Tip 2/3Natural Phenomena
Use 'refract' to explain why we see beautiful patterns like rainbows in nature.
The droplets in the atmosphere refract sunlight to create a rainbow.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Reflection
'Refract' isn't the same as 'reflect.' It's about bending within, not bouncing back.
The light doesn't reflect off the water, it refracts within it.
Pro Tip 1/3Medium Change
Refract is used when light crosses boundaries like air to water, altering its course.
The straw seems bent where it refracts at the water's surface.
Pro Tip 2/3Natural Phenomena
Use 'refract' to explain why we see beautiful patterns like rainbows in nature.
The droplets in the atmosphere refract sunlight to create a rainbow.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Reflection
'Refract' isn't the same as 'reflect.' It's about bending within, not bouncing back.
The light doesn't reflect off the water, it refracts within it.
Never forget "Refract"
Humans forget easily. That's why you should download WordUp: Smart reminders, word games, AI practice, and much more!
Video examples
The lovable (and lethal)...
a transparent, convex structure whose shape refracts light to enable sight. In humans, this lens is curved to process light waves traveling through air. But sea lions need to see their best at hundreds of meters deep. To accommodate, their eyes have a much rounder lens to refract light underwater,
Video examples
Richard Seymour: How...
then you can experience this. It's lovely because it is an embodiment of something refreshing and delicious. I might like it more than you like it, because I know how bloody hard it is to do it. It's stupefyingly difficult to make something that refracts light like that,
Video examples
The physics of surfing -...
Near the shore, the shallower seafloor constrains the motion of the waves to occur in a more limited region than out at sea, concentrating the wave energy near the surface. If the topography of the shoreline is even and smooth, this will refract the waves to become more
Video examples
The hidden network that...
it refracts, or bends as it exits into air. But if the ray travels at a shallow angle, it’ll bend so far that it stays trapped, bouncing along inside the glass. Under the right condition, something normally transparent to light can instead hide it from the world.
Video examples
Lunar Eclipse 101 PIPE...
Total lunar eclipses are the most striking of the three types because they turn the moon a sunset red. While shorter, blue wavelengths of light are scattered outward by the earth's atmosphere, longer, red wavelengths are refracted, or bent,
Video examples
How do glasses help us...
But many people develop refractive errors, either during childhood as their eyes are growing, or in later life as their eyes age. Imperfections in the cornea and lens cause refracted light to be focused in front of or behind the retina,
Video examples
Diane Cook & Len...
conditions and all of that but this unexpected fog rolled in from the Pacific Coast and both of us guest moonlight is beautiful enough on its own but when it's refracted and diffused by fog it's just really extraordinary and
Video examples
How glaciers impact...
aurora borealis and the glacier glows refracts light like a chandelier and were enveloped above and below with light and ice incredible unforgettable this moment for it's a part of who I am
Video examples
TIL: How Chameleons...
those crystals refract a different wavelength which makes them appear as though they're changing from green to blue to red to orange that's cool without larger scavengers to help them
Video examples
Safari Live - Day 4 PIPE...
I'll retain you asking about carnivals and what they feed on and if they eat the bones of the refracting sorry I put
Video examples
The lovable (and lethal)...
a transparent, convex structure whose shape refracts light to enable sight. In humans, this lens is curved to process light waves traveling through air. But sea lions need to see their best at hundreds of meters deep. To accommodate, their eyes have a much rounder lens to refract light underwater,
Video examples
Richard Seymour: How...
then you can experience this. It's lovely because it is an embodiment of something refreshing and delicious. I might like it more than you like it, because I know how bloody hard it is to do it. It's stupefyingly difficult to make something that refracts light like that,
Video examples
The physics of surfing -...
Near the shore, the shallower seafloor constrains the motion of the waves to occur in a more limited region than out at sea, concentrating the wave energy near the surface. If the topography of the shoreline is even and smooth, this will refract the waves to become more
Video examples
The hidden network that...
it refracts, or bends as it exits into air. But if the ray travels at a shallow angle, it’ll bend so far that it stays trapped, bouncing along inside the glass. Under the right condition, something normally transparent to light can instead hide it from the world.
Video examples
Lunar Eclipse 101 PIPE...
Total lunar eclipses are the most striking of the three types because they turn the moon a sunset red. While shorter, blue wavelengths of light are scattered outward by the earth's atmosphere, longer, red wavelengths are refracted, or bent,
Video examples
How do glasses help us...
But many people develop refractive errors, either during childhood as their eyes are growing, or in later life as their eyes age. Imperfections in the cornea and lens cause refracted light to be focused in front of or behind the retina,
Video examples
Diane Cook & Len...
conditions and all of that but this unexpected fog rolled in from the Pacific Coast and both of us guest moonlight is beautiful enough on its own but when it's refracted and diffused by fog it's just really extraordinary and
Video examples
How glaciers impact...
aurora borealis and the glacier glows refracts light like a chandelier and were enveloped above and below with light and ice incredible unforgettable this moment for it's a part of who I am
Video examples
TIL: How Chameleons...
those crystals refract a different wavelength which makes them appear as though they're changing from green to blue to red to orange that's cool without larger scavengers to help them
Video examples
Safari Live - Day 4 PIPE...
I'll retain you asking about carnivals and what they feed on and if they eat the bones of the refracting sorry I put
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
Alexandra Kleeman
American Author
I think of workshopping as a way to read your own work through the eyes of others - a scene that you write gets refracted by those around you, and suddenly you have several different readings of it, each with a different momentum for how it might be retooled or reshaped.
Quote examples
Jake Barton
American Designer
A lot of our insights are based on the ways in which people spend time at museums. They're curious, open, interested, and engaging. They want to express themselves and see their own identity refracted through the museum's.
Quote examples
David Shields
American Author
Immanence, or complicity, allows the writer to be a kind of shock absorber of the culture: to reflect back its 'whatness,' refracted through the sensibility of his consciousness.
Quote examples
Iain Sinclair
British Writer
If the landscape changes, then I don't know who I am either. The landscape is a refracted autobiography. As it disappears you lose your sense of self.
Quote examples
Jonathan Galassi
American Publisher
Poems are endlessly renewable resources. Whatever you bring to them, at whatever stage of life, gets mirrored back, refracted, reread in new ways.
Quote examples
Alex Tizon
Filipino Author
We all, to some degree, absorb the mythologies around us, our vision refracted by the prisms of our particular time and place.
Quote examples
Jennifer Haigh
American Novelist
Like all writers, I draw from life as I know it; but it's a refracted kind of reality, and none of it is factually true.
Quote examples
Bruce Dickinson
English Musician
I shall refract myself, yes, I shall no longer be known as the prism.
Quote examples
Alexandra Kleeman
American Author
I think of workshopping as a way to read your own work through the eyes of others - a scene that you write gets refracted by those around you, and suddenly you have several different readings of it, each with a different momentum for how it might be retooled or reshaped.
Quote examples
Jake Barton
American Designer
A lot of our insights are based on the ways in which people spend time at museums. They're curious, open, interested, and engaging. They want to express themselves and see their own identity refracted through the museum's.
Quote examples
David Shields
American Author
Immanence, or complicity, allows the writer to be a kind of shock absorber of the culture: to reflect back its 'whatness,' refracted through the sensibility of his consciousness.
Quote examples
Iain Sinclair
British Writer
If the landscape changes, then I don't know who I am either. The landscape is a refracted autobiography. As it disappears you lose your sense of self.
Quote examples
Jonathan Galassi
American Publisher
Poems are endlessly renewable resources. Whatever you bring to them, at whatever stage of life, gets mirrored back, refracted, reread in new ways.
Quote examples
Alex Tizon
Filipino Author
We all, to some degree, absorb the mythologies around us, our vision refracted by the prisms of our particular time and place.
Quote examples
Jennifer Haigh
American Novelist
Like all writers, I draw from life as I know it; but it's a refracted kind of reality, and none of it is factually true.
Quote examples
Bruce Dickinson
English Musician
I shall refract myself, yes, I shall no longer be known as the prism.
Example 1 of 8
WordUp Chrome Extension
As you browse the web instantly look up words you don’t know.
Get Chrome Extension