atom bomb
16
3.0
- noun
- /ˈætəm bɑm/
:
bomba atómica
- And he outlined what had happened in the atom bomb scare.
We dropped two atom bombs on two cities.
- We dropped two atom bombs on two cities.
- I mean, to take an example, suppose we want to build an atom bomb.
- Without Picasso, you know, there would never have been a Guernica, but without Oppenheimer, there would surely have still been an atom bomb.
- It was not the atom bomb that decided to bomb Hiroshima.
- And frankly, I don't believe that if one atom bomb goes off, I don't think that it can stop.
- There's no writing, there's no writings about ancient atom bombs.
- Other the dollar is still a very strong proportion of other countries holding because they realize it's strong because America has the atom bomb.
Examples
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The American atom bombs put a stop to that slaughter.
Blog text (22) -
On 6 August 1945, a B-29 Superfortress named the Enola Gay dropped an atom bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, with a second on Nagasaki following shortly.
Academic text (1996) -
We dropped two atom bombs on two cities.
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There are no atom bombs actually being dropped.
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It would take two atom bombs to make them finally surrender.
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My grandfather, Mackey F. Moore, built the trigger mechanism for the atom bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.
Blog text (11) -
The testing of the atom bomb at Bikini Atoll in 1946 caused widespread concern about nuclear warfare.
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The atom bomb released a tremendous amount of energy when it was detonated during World War II.
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Scientists studied the effects of the atom bomb to understand its impact on both the environment and human health.
Synonyms
∞
1.8
A container with explosive material that makes a large explosion and damages things
634
3.5
A very powerful bomb that uses energy from splitting or joining atoms
148
7.6
A very powerful bomb that uses nuclear energy
66
2.3
A very powerful weapon that splits atoms to make a huge explosion and destroy large areas
32
3.0
A very powerful weapon that splits atoms to release huge energy
11
3.5
A very powerful explosive that uses energy from splitting or joining atoms to destroy things
1
6.7
A bomb that releases a huge amount of energy by splitting heavy atoms like uranium or plutonium
How Destructive
Surface Forms
Morphology
The compound combines 'atom' (the smallest unit of matter) and 'bomb' (an explosive device), so a learner who knows both words can reasonably infer it is a bomb that uses atoms or atomic reactions. The specific technical detail (nuclear fission/fusion) may be beyond a B1 learner, but the core meaning 'a bomb based on atoms' is transparently derivable and is cross-linguistically similar.
Etymology
Atom bomb comes from the idea of breaking the tiny atom, which people long thought could not be broken, so to 'split' an atom was imagined to let out huge energy like a very large bomb. That's why atom bomb means a weapon that releases massive energy and causes great destruction.