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circuit breaker
[ sur-kit brey-ker ]
noun
- Also called breaker. Electricity. a device for interrupting an electric circuit to prevent excessive current, as that caused by a short circuit, from damaging the apparatus in the circuit or from causing a fire.
- Also called trad·ing halt [trey, -ding hawlt] or trading curb. Stock Exchange. a temporary halt in trading automatically imposed when stock prices reach a predetermined level, as to check panic selling.
- a lockdown or set of tight restrictions imposed for a fixed, usually short period to halt the spread of a highly transmissible infection (often used attributively):
Circuit breakers only succeed if additional measures are taken, such as contact tracing and increased testing.
- Australia, New Zealand. an activity serving to relieve or distract from stresses that might otherwise overwhelm:
Sometimes a day out of the office is the best circuit breaker after a tense week.
- any property-tax relief measure that reduces or limits property taxes for certain eligible taxpayers, as those with low income or the elderly.
circuit breaker
noun
- a device that under abnormal conditions, such as a short circuit, interrupts the flow of current in an electrical circuit Sometimes shortened tobreaker Compare fuse 2
circuit breaker
- A switch that automatically interrupts the flow of electric current if the current exceeds a preset limit, measured in amperes. Circuit breakers are used most often as a safety precaution where excessive current through a circuit could be hazardous. Unlike fuses, they can usually be reset and reused.
Word History and Origins
Origin of circuit breaker1
Example Sentences
Some function of his brain acted as a psi-circuit breaker, shutting off awareness before his mind could be blasted.
A circuit-breaker may be set so as to open its connections in one or more seconds after a certain current begins to flow.
A circuit-breaker with its contacts under oil offers a much smaller opportunity than a fuse for the maintenance of an arc.
The accompanying cut shows the combination of battery B, the circuit-breaker, and the rod mounted upon the box.
With motors an automatic circuit breaker, disconnecting all wires of the circuit, may serve as both switch and cut-out.
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