scintillation

American  

[sin-tl-ey-shuhn] / ˌsɪn tlˈeɪ ʃən /

noun

1. the act of scintillating; sparkling.

2. a spark or flash.

3. Astronomy. the twinkling or tremulous effect of the light of the stars.

4. Meteorology. any small-scale twinkling or shimmering of objects that are viewed through the atmosphere, caused by an interception of the observer's line of view by inhomogeneities in the atmospheric refractive index.

5. Physics.

   1. a flash of light from the ionization of a phosphor struck by an energetic photon or particle.

   2. random fluctuation of the amplitude, phase, or polarization of an electromagnetic wave.

6. (on a radar display) a slight, rapid shifting of a spot of light or the image of an object about its mean position.

---

scintillation British  

/ ˌsɪntɪˈleɪʃən /

noun

1. the act of scintillating

2. a spark or flash

3. the twinkling of stars or radio sources, caused by rapid changes in the density of the earth's atmosphere, the interplanetary medium, or the interstellar medium, producing uneven refraction of starlight

4. physics a flash of light produced when a material scintillates

---

Etymology

Origin of scintillation

First recorded in 1615–25, scintillation is from the Latin word scintillātiōn- (stem of scintillātiō ). See scintillate, -ion

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

scintillation

That timing control helps researchers focus on periods when genuine scintillation light is most likely to be present while filtering out random background signals and other spurious counts.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 17, 2026

They found that the strength of scintillation varied noticeably over periods lasting from days to several months.

From Science Daily ● Jan. 6, 2026

All radio signals that pass through interstellar space experience scintillation.

From Science Daily ● Jan. 6, 2026

With each technological shift, the scintillation of new possibilities meets the tug of obsolescence.

From New York Times ● Jun. 6, 2024

Geiger and Marsden recorded the particles’ scattering by observing the flash, or scintillation, produced whenever one struck a glass plate coated with zinc sulfide.

From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik