Definition

1. Noun:

   • The organ inside the head: The soft mass of nerve tissue that controls thought, memory, feeling, and activity in a person or animal.
   • Intellectual ability or intelligence: The ability to think clearly and learn quickly; a person who is very intelligent.
   • The mind or intellect: The part of a person responsible for their thoughts and feelings.
   • (plural) Brains: Intelligence or good sense.
   • The main control center or most important person: The person or thing that provides the most ideas and direction for a group or activity.

2. Verb:

   • To hit someone hard on the head: To strike someone's head violently.
   • (informal) To think deeply about something: To concentrate hard to solve a problem or understand something.

Usage Examples

• Noun:

  • The human brain is a complex organ.
  • She has a brilliant brain for mathematics.
  • I can't get that song out of my brain.
  • It doesn't take much brain to see the problem.
  • He's the brain behind the company's success.

• Verb:

  • The falling rock nearly brained him.
  • We need to brain a solution to this issue.

Advanced Usage

• To brain something out: To think something through very carefully to find a solution.

  • Let's brain this problem out together.

• To have something on the brain: To be constantly thinking about something.

  • He's got football on the brain all season.

Variants and Related Words

• Brainy (adj): Very intelligent.
  • She's the brainy one in the family.
• Brainless (adj): Stupid; showing a complete lack of thought.
  • It was a brainless thing to do.
• Brainchild (n): An idea or invention of one person.
  • The festival was her brainchild.
• Brainstorm (n/v): A sudden clever idea; to generate ideas quickly in a group.
  • We need to brainstorm some new marketing strategies.

Synonyms

• Noun (intelligence): Intellect, mind, intelligence, genius.
• Noun (organ): Cerebrum, gray matter.
• Verb (hit): Strike, bash.

Related Phrasal Verbs

• Brain up: (informal) To become smarter or more knowledgeable about something.
  • You need to brain up on the rules before the test.

Related Idioms

• Pick someone's brain(s): To ask someone questions in order to get information or advice from them.
  • Can I pick your brain about computer repairs?
• Rack one's brain(s): To think very hard to remember something or solve a problem.
  • I racked my brains trying to remember her name.
• The brains behind something: The person who plans and organizes something clever or complicated.
  • She was the brains behind the whole operation.

Noun

1. the brain of certain animals used as meat
2. someone who has exceptional intellectual ability and originality
   • Mozart was a child genius
   • he's smart but he's no Einstein
3. that which is responsible for one's thoughts and feelings; the seat of the faculty of reason
   • his mind wandered
   • I couldn't get his words out of my head
4. mental ability
   • he's got plenty of brains but no common sense
5. that part of the central nervous system that includes all the higher nervous centers; enclosed within the skull; continuous with the spinal cord

Verb

1. kill by smashing someone's skull
2. hit on the head