| 释义 |
backbone|ˈbækˈbəʊn|
Forms: 3 bacbon, 4 bakbon, bakebon, 5 bakbone, 4–7 backebone, 6– backbone. (In 5–7 often two words; still sometimes hyphened.)
[f. back n. 1 + bone.]
1. The vertebral column, the spine. to the backbone: thoroughly, completely.
a1300W. de Biblesworth in Wright Voc. 146 Bacbon, l'etchine. a1400Leg. Rood 190 Þe cros behind his bakbon Þat he þolud deth uppon. 1523Fitzherb. Husb. (1534) F iv b, He wyll eate soo moche, that his sydes wyll stande as hygh as his backe bone. 1647J. Hall Poems 89 How many back-bones nourisht have Crawling Serpents in the grave? 1849W. Irving Crayon Misc. 165 It struck a buffalo..broke its back-bone. 1864Duke of Manchester Crt. Soc. Eliz. to Anne II. 107 Harry was English to the backbone.
2. transf. A main support or axis, or chief substantial part; e.g. the backbone of a bicycle; the chief mountain-range or water-shed of a country.
1684T. Burnet The. Earth I. 142 The Appennines strike through Italy..the back-bone of that country. 1865Tylor Early Hist. Man. vii. 162 The Cordilleras, or backbone of America. 1879A. Galletly in Cassell's Techn. Educ. IV. 390/2 The ‘back-bone’ of the chenille..is composed of several strong cotton threads.
3. fig. The main or important element; mainstay.
1849Cobden Speeches 64, I speak to the clothiers..the backbone and muscle of the clothing district of England. 1871Earle Philol. Eng. Tong. §313 We are now come to the backbone of our subject. 1884J. Bent in Macm. Mag. Oct. 429/2 A secret society which was the backbone of Panhellenism.
4. Strength of character, stability of purpose, resoluteness, sturdiness, firmness.
1843C. Brontë Let. 13 Oct. in Mrs. Gaskell Life I. 299 A pretty-looking..young man, apparently constructed without a backbone... I don't allude to his corporal spine..but to his character. 1865Sat. Rev. 18 Feb. 195 A great man he..could never have been..for his character was destitute of backbone. 1884Pall Mall G. 23 Feb. 5 [This] has completely taken the backbone out of the discount market.
▸ Chem. A chain of atoms or groups which forms the main structural axis of a molecule, esp. a polymer.
1915A. P. Mathews Physiol. Chem. iv. 170 In these suggestions the backbone of the molecule consisted of four molecules of phosphoric acid to which the bases and carbohydrates were attached. 1932Jrnl. Soc. Chem. Industry Trans. 51 141/2 If the structure of proteins is considered, their molecules are found to consist essentially of a main axis or backbone, which has a repeating unit formed of a three-atom chain. 1961Ann. Reg. 1960 401 The polypeptide chain, the backbone of the protein molecule, was found to be coiled in a helix-like spiral spring with only a space inside. 1999Ambix 46 94 A complete chemical description of the sugar backbone of desoxyribose nucleic acid was now possible.
▸ Telecomm. and Computing. A primary or central link in a communications network; the infrastructure formed by a system of such links. In later use freq.: spec. a high-speed, high-capacity digital connection which forms the axis of a local or wide area network.
1924Bell Syst. Techn. Jrnl. 3 495 ‘Backbone’ circuits..supply a network of trunk lines for the entire Bell system. 1970IEEE Trans. Vehicular Technol. 19 57/1 The following backbone would have the communications capacity of transmitting a video bandwidth signal plus the equivalent bandwidth of 110 narrow-band FM channels in each direction. 1987Desktop Publ. Today Nov. 35/4 Fastpath can also be used to bridge AppleTalk networks along a high speed Ethernet backbone. 1995Internet World Aug. 14/2 On May 13 the U.S. Government officially dismantled the NSFnet—the Internet backbone running from New York to San Francisco—and turned Internet provision over to commercial vendors. 1999Wired Dec. 347/1 To prevent such situations from clogging the backbone, each router subtracts 1 from this number, called the hop limit, every time it handles a packet. |