cluster

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English[edit]

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Wikipedia

A cluster of mushrooms.
A star cluster

Etymology[edit]

From Middle English cluster, from Old English cluster, clyster (“cluster, bunch, branch”), from Proto-Germanic *klus-, *klas- (“to clump, lump together”) + Proto-Germanic *-þrą (instrumental suffix), related to Low German Kluuster (“cluster”), Dutch dialectal klister (“cluster”), Swedish kluster (“cluster”), Icelandic klasi (“cluster; bunch of grapes”).

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

cluster (plural clusters)

  1. A group or bunch of several discrete items that are close to each other.
    a cluster of islands
    • Spenser
      Her deeds were like great clusters of ripe grapes, / Which load the bunches of the fruitful vine.
    • 1907, Harold Bindloss, chapter 7, The Dust of Conflict:
      Then there was no more cover, for they straggled out, not in ranks but clusters, from among orange trees and tall, flowering shrubs […] ,
    • 2011 December 29, Keith Jackson, “SPL: Celtic 1 Rangers 0”, Daily Record:
      Charlie Mulgrew’s delicious deadball delivery was attacked by a cluster of green and white shirts at McGregor’s back post but Ledley got up higher and with more purpose than anyone else to thump a header home from five yards.
    • 2013 May-June, William E. Conner, “An Acoustic Arms Race”, American Scientist, volume 101, number 3, page 206-7: 
      Earless ghost swift moths become “invisible” to echolocating bats by forming mating clusters close (less than half a meter) above vegetation and effectively blending into the clutter of echoes that the bat receives from the leaves and stems around them.
    A cluster of flowers grew in the pot.
  2. A number of individuals grouped together or collected in one place; a crowd; a mob.
    • Milton
      As bees […] / Pour forth their populous youth about the hive / In clusters.
    • Shakespeare
      We loved him; but, like beasts / And cowardly nobles, gave way unto your clusters, / Who did hoot him out o' the city.
  3. (astronomy) A group of galaxies or stars that appear near each other.
    The Pleiades cluster contains seven bright stars.
  4. (music) A secundal chord of three or more notes.
  5. (phonetics) A group of consonants.
    The word "scrub" begins with a cluster of three consonants.
  6. (computing) A group of computers that work together.
  7. (computing) A logical data storage unit containing one or more physical sectors (see block).
  8. (statistics) A significant subset within a population.
  9. (military) Set of bombs or mines.
  10. (army) A small metal design that indicates that a medal has been awarded to the same person before.
  11. (chemistry) An ensemble of bound atoms or molecules, intermediate in size between a molecule and a bulk solid.

Derived terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

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Translations to be checked

Verb[edit]

cluster (third-person singular simple present clusters, present participle clustering, simple past and past participle clustered)

  1. (intransitive) To form a cluster or group.
    The children clustered around the puppy.
    • Tennyson
      His sunny hair / Cluster'd about his temples, like a god's.
    • Foxe
      the princes of the country clustering together

Translations[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

Dutch[edit]

Etymology[edit]

Borrowing from English cluster

Pronunciation[edit]

  • Hyphenation: clus‧ter

Noun[edit]

cluster f, m, m (plural clusters, diminutive clustertje n)

  1. cluster

Portuguese[edit]

Noun[edit]

cluster m (plural clusters)

  1. (music) cluster (chord of three or more notes)
  2. (computing) cluster (group of computers working concurrently)
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