Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To regulate or adjust to a certain degree.
- intransitive verb To change or vary the pitch, intensity, or tone of (one's voice or a musical instrument, for example).
- intransitive verb To vary the frequency, amplitude, phase, or other characteristic of (electromagnetic waves).
- intransitive verb To vary (electron velocity) in an electron beam.
- intransitive verb Biochemistry To act on (a receptor) as an agonist, antagonist, or both.
- intransitive verb To move from one key or tonality to another by means of a melody or chord progression.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To modify; adjust; adapt; regulate.
- To vary or inflect the sound or utterance of, especially so as to give expressiveness to what is uttered; vary or adapt in tone.
- To vary the pitch of; inflect; melodize.
- In music, to change from one key (tonality) to another, by utilizing one or more of the tones common to both.
- In music, to pass from one key (tonality) into another, or from the major into the minor mode, or vice versa. See
modulation , 3 . - Hence To vary, oscillate, or fluctuate.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb To form, as sound, to a certain key, or to a certain portion.
- transitive verb To vary or inflect in a natural, customary, or musical manner.
- transitive verb (Electronics) To alter the amplitude, frequency, phase, or intensity of (the carrier wave of a radio signal) at intervals, so as to represent information to be conveyed by the signal; -- a technique used to convey information by means of radio waves transmitted by one electronic device and received by another.
- intransitive verb (Mus.) To pass from one key into another.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive To
regulate ,adjust oradapt - verb transitive To
change thepitch ,intensity ortone of one'svoice or of amusical instrument - verb transitive (electronics) to
vary theamplitude ,frequency orphase of acarrier wave inproportion to the amplitude etc of asource wave (such asspeech ormusic ) - verb intransitive, music to
move from onekey ortonality to another, especially by using achord progression
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb vary the frequency, amplitude, phase, or other characteristic of (electromagnetic waves)
- verb fix or adjust the time, amount, degree, or rate of
- verb vary the pitch of one's speech
- verb change the key of, in music
- verb adjust the pitch, tone, or volume of
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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He often possessed a voice that was a marvelous instrument, a voice he could modulate from a sepulchral whisper to a crashing thunder clap.
God's Trombones Seven Negro Sermons in Verse Charles Buckles 1960
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The idea is to kind of modulate the depth -- to have more gentle moments, then have kind of deeper moments.
Q&A: Will All Movies Be 3-D in the Future?: Bruce Handy Handy, Bruce 2008
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Without the ability to add additional pressure above this very low maximum, the ability to "modulate" pressure, except towards even less pressure (and lower oxygen dose), does not even exist.
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This will squeeze the pads harder against the rim, even if you are trying to modulate the pressure with your hand on the lever.
Technical FAQ with Lennard Zinn: LZ suggests some New Year’s resolutions for the bike industry 2011
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I think we women still tend to modulate our capabilities to those around us.
Maria Rodale: 5 Lessons for My Daughters Maria Rodale 2011
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Organisms and cultures constantly modulate both telic orientation and process relations for optimality in the evolutionary sense — optimality is achieved, if at all, in the aggregate and never in the instance, but cannot be achieved at all programmatically, or algorithmically, whether the algorithm or program be defined by ends or means.
The Volokh Conspiracy » Paternalistic versus Therapeutic? 2010
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We are asked to mine those things often and a lot of it is up to the editing and the director about how you modulate it.
Oscar-Winning Actress Explores Loss, Grief in 'Rabbit Hole' 2011
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"Dietary berries and ellagic acid prevent oxidative DNA damage and modulate expression of DNA repair genes."
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We are asked to mine those things often and a lot of it is up to the editing and the director about how you modulate it.
Oscar-Winning Actress Explores Loss, Grief in 'Rabbit Hole' 2011
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I think we women still tend to modulate our capabilities to those around us.
Maria Rodale: 5 Lessons for My Daughters Maria Rodale 2011
fbharjo commented on the word modulate
see you on the range when its time for a change
May 12, 2008