Definition

Noun: 1. A steady sound without overtones: A pure tone is a sound wave consisting of a single frequency. It is characterized by a smooth, sinusoidal waveform and lacks the harmonic complexity (overtones) found in most natural sounds, such as musical notes or speech.

Usage

A "pure tone" is a technical term used primarily in acoustics, audiology, and sound engineering. It refers to a simple, single-frequency sound used for testing, calibration, or scientific study. * It is commonly used to test hearing sensitivity (audiometry). * It describes an idealized sound in physics and signal processing.

Examples

• Noun:
  • The audiologist presented a series of pure tones to each ear to measure the patient's hearing thresholds.
  • In the physics lab, we generated a 1000 Hz pure tone using a signal generator.
  • Unlike the rich sound of a violin, a tuning fork produces a nearly pure tone.

Advanced Usage

• "Pure-tone audiometry": The standard hearing test where a person indicates when they can hear pure tones of varying frequencies and intensities.
  • The results of the pure-tone audiometry were plotted on an audiogram.

Variants and Related Words

• Sine wave (n): The graphical representation of a pure tone's pressure variation over time. While a pure tone is the sound, a sine wave is its visual or mathematical form.
• Tone (n): A more general term for a sound with a definite pitch. A pure tone is a specific type of simple tone.
• Complex tone (n): A sound composed of multiple frequencies (a fundamental frequency and its overtones), which is the opposite of a pure tone.

Synonyms

• Simple tone: A direct synonym, emphasizing the lack of harmonic complexity.
• Sinusoidal tone: A technical synonym highlighting the sinusoidal nature of the sound wave.

Antonyms

• Complex tone: A sound containing multiple related frequencies (harmonics).
• Noise: A sound containing many unrelated frequencies, often without a definite pitch.

Noun

1. a steady sound without overtones
   • they tested his hearing with pure tones of different frequencies