breakthrough
/ˈbɹeɪk.θɹu/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: 3.83 in modern English
25
Scrabble Score
12
Letters
2
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Characterized by major progress or overcoming some obstacle.
adj
Involving the contraction of a disease by a person with a decreased susceptibility, such as a person who has been vaccinated to help prevent that disease.
noun
An advance through and past enemy lines.
noun
Any major progress; such as a great innovation or discovery that overcomes a significant obstacle.
noun
The penetration of the opposition's defence.
Example Sentences
- "a breakthrough technological advance"
- "Breakthrough infections (urine infections that develop in children on antibiotics) can occasionally occur, and if they do, different preventative antibiotics can be given or sometimes surgery to fix the leaky valve can be undertaken."
- "There is also growing evidence that while Omicron may cause many breakthrough cases among previously infected or previously vaccinated populations, the morbidity and mortality associated with the disease among them will be lower, they added."
- "Albert Einstein is credited with making some of the greatest breakthroughs in modern physics."
- "In [Raymond] Kurzweil’s future, biotechnology and nanotechnology give us the power to manipulate our bodies and the world around us at will, at the molecular level. Progress hyperaccelerates, and every hour brings a century’s worth of scientific breakthroughs."
- ""Secondly, we have to find more cost-effective ways of electrifying. And we've had a real breakthrough in the last couple of years in terms of bridge clearances and immunisation, meaning we've been able to take hundreds of millions of pounds off the cost of electrification."
Etymology
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈbɹeɪk.θɹu/
- British English: /ˈbɹeɪk.θɹuː/