fracture
/ˈfraktʃə
/noun [mass noun]
1The cracking or breaking of a hard object or material: ground movements could cause fracture of the pipe...
- The authors conclude from this study that the risk of hip fracture in elderly persons can be greatly reduced by the use of a hip-protector device.
- They are potentially suitable for use by older people at high risk of hip fracture rather than older people generally.
- Today there is a wide range of therapeutic options and several safe and effective medical treatments to reduce the risk of fracture by up to 50 per cent.
Synonyms
breaking, breakage, cracking, cleavage, rupture, shattering, fragmentation, splintering, splitting, separation, bursting, disintegration
1.1 [count noun] A crack or break in a hard object or material, typically a bone or a rock stratum: a fracture of the left leg...
- Stress fractures are partial fractures, often hairline cracks in the bone, caused by repeated stress.
- Direct injury to the spine may cause a bone fracture anywhere along your vertebral column.
- Bone scanning is sensitive but not specific for detecting stress fractures, healing fractures, infections and tumors.
Synonyms
break, breakage, crack, split
crack, split, fissure, crevice, break, rupture, breach, rift, cleft, slit, chink, gap, cranny, interstice, opening, aperture, rent;
crazing
1.2The physical appearance of a freshly broken rock or mineral, especially as regards the shape of the surface formed: obsidian shows a conchoidal fracture...
- Alteration of this mineral has produced an unusual abundance of vivianite coatings on fracture surfaces in the rock.
- It forms attractive dendrites on fracture surfaces.
- The mineral is brittle with a conchoidal to uneven fracture.
2 Phonetics The replacement of a simple vowel by a diphthong owing to the influence of a following sound, typically a consonant.
2.1 [count noun] A diphthong substituted by fracture.
verb
1Break or cause to break: [no object]: the stone has fractured [with object]: ancient magmas fractured by the forces of wind and ice...
- His characters are fractured, broken people, who find happiness too late and too unsatisfactorily, if at all.
- Broken columns of rock fractured from the face are tumbled like a game of jackstraws below.
- This inequality leads to fracturing within the stone and eventual disintegration.
Synonyms
break, snap, crack, cleave, rupture, shatter, smash, smash to smithereens, fragment, splinter, split, separate, burst, blow out;
sever, divide, tear, rend;
disintegrate, fall to bits, fall to pieces
informal bust
rare shiver
1.1 [with object] Sustain a fracture of (a bone): (as adjective fractured) a fractured skull...
- The scaphoid is the most commonly fractured bone of the wrist.
- The mammalian liver can regenerate if a part of it is removed, the antlers of male deer regenerate each year, and fractured bones can mend by a regenerative process.
- She has never required any surgical procedures or fractured any bones.
Synonyms
broken, cracked, splintered, shattered, ruptured
1.2(With reference to a group or organization) split or fragment and become unable to function or exist: [no object]: the movement had fractured without his leadership...
- But the splits that fractured the women's movement are hairline cracks compared with the schisms within the Pankhurst family itself.
- By the time he had resigned from his position he'd fractured the organization in two and been accused by his own department as being ‘dangerous’.
- Generations are split up and badly fractured like never before.
1.3 (as adjective fractured) (Of speech or a language) faltering and full of mistakes; broken: they’d misinterpreted his fractured English...
- But in China these days, fractured French and its equally mal-appropriate cousins are no laughing matter.
- Half-understood insults and ironic declarations of love converge into a disorienting swirl of fractured English and pidgin Arabic.
- On the other hand, I love sketching building plans and am well capable of pursuing recalcitrant plumbers and joiners in fractured French.
Origin
Late Middle English: from French, or from Latin fractura, from frangere 'to break'.