hot spot

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun An area in which there is dangerous unrest or hostile action.
• noun Informal A lively and popular place, such as a nightclub.
• noun An area of intense heat, radiation, or activity.
• noun A public area where a short-range wireless transmitter provides high-speed access to the Internet.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun A dangerous place of violent political unrest
• noun A lively and entertaining place, such as a nightclub
• noun An area of radioactive contamination
• noun computing A part of an application that consumes a significant amount of execution time
• noun computing, graphical user interface Part of a control that responds dynamically as the user moves the pointer over it, as for example in an image map.
• noun genetics The region of a gene in which there is higher than normal rate of mutation
• noun networking A location in which WiFi Internet access is available
• noun planetology, geology The surface manifestation of a plume that rises from deep in the celestial body’s mantle

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun a place of political unrest and potential violence
• noun a lively entertainment spot
• noun a point of relatively intense heat or radiation