pacemaker
/ˈpeɪsmeɪkə
/noun
1A person or animal who sets the pace at the beginning of a race, sometimes in order to help a runner break a record: he acted as a pacemaker for Bannister when he broke the four-minute mile...
- That is some record for a horse used primarily in those races as a pacemaker.
- The pair was among seven for the 2,400-meter race, including both their respective pacemakers, Diyapour and High Action.
- He and Chris Chataway were the pacemakers as Bannister became the first man to break the four-minute barrier for the mile.
1.1A person who sets standards of achievement for others: unbeaten Rangers are the surprise pacemakers...
- Even though the automobile industry had also remained the pacemaker when it came to wages and working standards for its employees, it was not without its periods of labor turbulence - nor was it lacking in the desire to find workable and satisfactory solutions to labor problems.
- This is a practice called ‘speeding up the line,’ for every man down the line must keep up with the pacemaker's pace or he'll be thrown out for another worker.
2A device for stimulating the heart muscle and regulating its contractions.The most common forms of heart failure are treated with drugs and electrical devices such as pacemakers and implanted defibrillators, but if symptoms continue to worsen, other therapies are needed....
- For the medical device industry, only ads for risky devices such as pacemakers or artificial hearts must disclose negative side effects.
- Medical devices such as cardiac pacemakers, cochlear implants, and bone growth stimulators are valuable tools in the treatment of patients with multiple medical needs.
2.1The part of the heart muscle (the sino-atrial node) which normally regulates contractions.This node is called the pacemaker of the heart because it sets the rate of the heartbeat and causes the rest of the heart to contract in its rhythm....
- The sinus node is a natural pacemaker in your heart that helps your heart beat steadily.
- Sinus dysrhythmia refers to a malfunction of the sinus node, the heart's natural pacemaker.
2.2The part of an organ or of the body which controls rhythmic physiological activity: the brain’s circadian pacemaker which regulates our ‘biological clock’...
- For this reason, the researchers decided to examine the output of the body's internal clock, called the circadian pacemaker.
- Escape rhythms are the result of spontaneous activity from a subsidiary pacemaker, located in the atria, atrioventricular junction, or ventricles.
- In 1998 the journal Science published a report that indicated that light exposure to the back of the knee may reset the human circadian pacemaker.
Derivatives
pacemaking
- Going into this game two points adrift of the pacemaking Potters, the Saints pulled out all the stops to win in devastating style.
- The Saul side now occupy second spot, one point behind pacemaking Round House with a host of teams lining up behind them.
- At the moment they trail pacemaking Comber Rec by six points, but have two games in hand.