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''turbine'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260628200224-00-⌔

turbine - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Noun

turbine (plural turbines)

• Any of various rotary machines that use the kinetic energy of a continuous stream of fluid (a liquid or a gas) to turn a shaft.
  • ✤ Upstream from the house is a watermill, cased in gleaming white weather-boarding, which has been restored to working order. Near by is the water-driven turbine which[Rudyard] Kipling had installed in 1902 to light his mansion with electricity.¹
  • ✤ * Turbines have been around for a long time—windmills and water wheels are early examples. The name comes from the Latin turbo, meaning vortex, and thus the defining property of a turbine is that a fluid or gas turns the blades of a rotor, which is attached to a shaft that can perform useful work. […] Through the efforts of many thousands of engineers in the intervening 70 years or so, such gas turbines have come to dominate aircraft propulsion and, with their now-unmatched thermal efficiency and low cost, are the superstars of electric power plants.*²

Etymology

Borrowed from French turbine, from Latin turbō, turbinem (“tornado, whirlwind; crowd”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ˈtɜː.baɪn/, /ˈtɜː.bɪn/
• (General American, Canada) IPA: /ˈtɝ.baɪn/, /ˈtɝ.bɪn/
  • Audio (US): 🔊
• (Australian) IPA: /ˈtɜː.bɑɪn/, /ˈtɜː.bɪn/

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 1980, AA Book of British Villages, Drive Publications Ltd, page 98: ↩

2. 2013 July-August, Lee S. Langston, “The Adaptable Gas Turbine]”, in American Scientist ‎${}^{[1]}$, archived from the original on 7 September 2013: ↩

Link to original

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