Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
🌬️ To scatter 🌈 To split colors
to disperse

to disperse

2 7.4
To separate white light into different colors, like a rainbow
  • verb
  • /dɪsˈpɜrs/
  • Specialized
translation icon : dispersar
  • The glass prism can disperse white light into its various colors effectively.
  • disperse light
  • prism can disperse

Examples

  • Light was dispersed—for example, by a prism or diffraction grating—and the intensity measured as a function of wavelength.

    Academic text (2012)

  • And so it refracts in, disperses and those then come out.

  • And so the light is dispersed right in space.

  • By dispersing it, the composition of the incident light can be determined.

    Academic text (1996)

  • PHOTO (COLOR): Isaac Newton discovered in the mid-17th century that a prism can disperse white light into the colors of a rainbow.

    Academic text (2004)

  • When sunlight passes through a prism, it will disperse into a rainbow of colors.

  • She used a crystal to disperse the light, creating beautiful patterns on the wall.

Synonyms

to prism
vsto disperse
  • Specialized
8.1

To shape an object so it bends light and splits it into colors

describes separating light into its spectral colors by passing it through a shaped medium

How Separated

to split
513 1.3
to disperse
  • Specialized
2 7.4
to refract
  • Specialized
8 6.3
to separate
297 1.9

Surface Forms

disperse infinitive
dispersed past
dispersed past participle
dispersing present participle
disperses third person singular

Morphology

disperse = sparse (semi-transparent) = dis + sperse

The optical sense ('separate into spectral colors') is an extension of the general idea of separation/scattering (related to 'sparse'), but it is a specialized technical usage and the stem is not a standalone modern base.

Etymology

The word disperse comes from the Latin parts dis- ('apart') and spargere ('to scatter') and shares its root with sparse, which means 'thinly spread'. So to disperse light is to 'scatter apart' its colours, which is why a prism breaks white light into a rainbow.