/blɑːst/, /blæst/
OriginFrom Middle English blast, blest, from Old English blǣst (“blowing, blast”), from Proto-West Germanic *blāstu, from Proto-Germanic *blēstuz (“blowing, blast”).
Cognate with West Frisian blast (“blast”), dialectal Dutch blast (“stubborn intent, drumming”), obsolete German Blast (“wind, blowing”), German blasen (“to blow”), Dutch blazen (“to blow”), Danish blæst (“wind”), French blaser (“to blunt, dull”). More at blow.
- countable, uncountableA violent gust of wind (in windy weather) or apparent wind (around a moving vehicle).
“And see where surly Winter passes off, / Far to the north, and calls his ruffian blasts; / His blasts obey, and quit the howling hill.”
“Their warm, thick under covering of fine wool protects them from the coldest blasts.”
- countable, uncountableA forcible stream of gas or liquid from an orifice, for example from a bellows, the tuyeres of a blast furnace, a person's mouth, etc.
- countable, uncountableA hit of a recreational drug from a pipe.
- countable, uncountableThe continuous blowing to which one charge of ore or metal is subjected in a furnace.
“Many tons of iron were melted at a blast.”
“Blast was produced by bellows worked by four 'blowers', three of whom worked at a time while the fourth stood ready to replace one of the others.”
- countable, uncountableThe exhaust steam from an engine, driving a column of air out of a boiler chimney, and thus creating an intense draught through the fire; also, any draught produced by the blast.
- countable, uncountableAn explosion, especially for the purpose of destroying a mass of rock, etc.
“arc blast”
“Blast after blast, fiery outbreak after fiery outbreak, like a flaming barrage from within,[…]most of Edison's grounds soon became an inferno. As though on an incendiary rampage, the fires systematica”
“Signalman Bridges was killed by the blast, as was fireman Nightall. Amazingly, driver Gimbert came round some 200 yards away, on the grass outside the Station Hotel where he had been flung.”
- countable, uncountableA verbal attack or punishment; a severe criticism or reprimand.
“My manager gave me a blast yesterday for coming in late.”
“P. S.—I gave the P. O. Department a blast in the papers about sending misdirected letters of mine back to the writers for reshipment, and got a blast in return, through a New York daily, from the New ”
- countable, uncountableAn explosive charge for blasting.
“1852-1854, Charles Tomlinson, Cyclopaedia of Useful Arts
Large blasts are often used.”
- countableA loud, sudden sound.
“One blast upon his bugle horn / Were worth a thousand men.”
“the blast of triumph o'er thy grave”
“Then the captain sung out: ¶ "Stand away!" and the cannon let off such a blast right before me that it made me deef with the noise and pretty near blind with the smoke, and I judged I was gone.”
- uncountableUnwanted noise from a microphone.
“[…] the microphone has been unostentatiously working out its own destiny here and abroad, mainly in America. Evolution seems to be most promising (in the elimination of "microphone blast" and backgrou”
- countable, uncountableA sudden pernicious effect, as if by a noxious wind, especially on animals and plants; a blight.
“By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed.”
“Vertue preferd from fell deſtuctions blaſt,”
- countable, figuratively, informal, uncountableA good time; an enjoyable moment.
“We had a blast at the party last night.”
- countable, uncountableA promotional message sent to an entire mailing list.
“an e-mail blast; a fax blast”
- countable, uncountableA flatulent disease of sheep.
- countable, slang, uncountableA period of full dosage of PEDs as opposed to a period of reduced intake.
- An immature or undifferentiated cell (e.g., lymphoblast, myeloblast).
- transitiveTo make an impression on, by making a loud blast or din.
“Trumpeters, / With brazen din blast you the city's ear.”
- intransitiveTo make a loud noise.
- informal, transitiveTo play (music) very loudly out of a speaker.
“Some kid is in his car blasting rap. You know, bass in the trunk and you can hear it 4 blocks away? I signal over to him and say "Hey, turn it up, I can't hear it." He turns around and says, "Shut Up ”
- transitiveTo shatter, as if by an explosion.
- transitiveTo open up a hole in, usually by means of a sudden and imprecise method (such as an explosion).
“Blast right through it.”
- transitiveTo curse; to damn.
“Blast it! Foiled again.”
- transitiveTo shoot, especially with an energy weapon (as opposed to one which fires projectiles).
“Chewbacca blasted the Stormtroopers with his laser rifle.”
- To shoot; kick the ball in hope of scoring a goal.
“A Ricketts and Stuart Holden one-two around the box then created a decent chance for an almost instant equaliser - but Welsh full-back Ricketts blasted over when a calmer finish could have been reward”
- intransitive, slang, transitiveTo shoot; to attack or shoot (someone or a place).
“They showed up blasting.”
“That's when we decided to blast him.”
- transitiveTo criticize or reprimand severely; to verbally discipline or punish.
“My manager suddenly blasted me yesterday for being a little late to work for five days in a row, because I was never getting myself up on time.”
“Mark Pritchard, a Tory member of Parliament, blasted the show for treating a somber subject as “a matter of fun.””
- transitiveTo bring destruction or ruin on; to destroy.
“Oh Portius, is there not some choſen Curſe,
Some hidden Thunder in the Stores of Heav’n,
Red with uncommon Wrath, to blaſt the Man
Who owes his Greatneſs to his Country’s Ruin?”
“Both Leo and myself rushed to her - she was stone dead - blasted into death by some mysterious electric agency or overwhelming will-force whereof the dread She had command.”
- transitiveTo blight or wither.
“A cold wind blasted the rose plants.”
- intransitive, obsoleteTo be blighted or withered.
“The bud blasted in the blossom.”
“Tell age it daily wasteth;
tell honour how it alters;
Tell beauty how she blasteth;
tell fauour how it falters:
And as they shall reply,
giue euery one the lye.”
- intransitive, obsoleteTo blow, for example on a trumpet.
- slangTo have a period of full dosage of PEDs as opposed to reducing them during a cruise period.
- informal, transitiveTo run a nucleotide sequence (for nucleic acids) or an amino acid sequence (for proteins) through a BLAST (Basic Local Alignment Search Tool).
“Blasting nucleotide sequences is not always that easy, because there is more ambiguity to the nucleotide sequence, and good hits have to have a 70% homology over the whole sequence to be reliable, com”
- alt-of, informal, transitiveAlternative letter-case form of blast (to run a sequence through BLAST)
“This program is also capable of BLASTing sequencing results and works with most automated sequencing formats, alleviating the need for conversion of PC-based files.”
- British, informalUsed to show anger or disappointment: damn
“Now, where's my Labour membership card, so I can consider whether to tear it up? Blast, it's plastic...”
- An algorithm which compares similarities between sequences of nucleotides in nucleic acids or of amino acids in proteins.
Formsblasts(plural) · blasts(present, singular, third-person) · blasting(participle, present) · blasted(participle, past) · blasted(past) · BLAST(alternative) · BLASTs(present, singular, third-person) · BLASTing(participle, present) · BLASTed(participle, past) · BLASTed(past)
Source: Wiktionary