Word of the Day

: April 11, 2014

collimate

verb KAH-luh-mayt

What It Means

: to make (something, such as light rays) parallel

collimate in Context

"Amazingly, some astrophysical jets-streams of charged particles collimated and accelerated over astronomical distances-also exhibit a helical structure." - From an article by Mario Livio on The Huffington Post, November 20, 2013

"The higher cost and fixed eyepieces of the … binoculars are distinct disadvantages, but setup time is reduced-there's no need to collimate optics or align tube assemblies." - From a product review by Phil Harrington in Astronomy, February 2004

Did You Know?

One might expect a science-y word like "collimate" to have a straightforward etymology, but that's not the case. "Collimate" comes from Latin "collimare," a misreading of the Latin word "collineare," meaning "to direct in a straight line." The erroneous "collimare" appeared in some editions of the works of ancient Roman statesman Cicero and scholar Aulus Gellius. The error was propagated by later writers-most notably by astronomers, such as Johannes Kepler, who wrote in Latin. And so it was the spelling "collimate," rather than "collineate," that passed into English in the 19th century.