transect
Americanverb (used with object)
verb
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of transect
1625–35; tran(s)- + Latin sectus, past participle of secāre to cut, sever ( see section)
Explanation
You could say that your favorite hiking trails transect a wooded hillside, since transect means "cut across." Use the verb transect when one thing divides or runs across another. Careful stitches might transect your grandmother's quilt, and a new highway might transect a historic city neighborhood. When you see the Latin prefix trans, you can be sure the word includes some sense of "across." In the case of transect, trans is combined with sect, from the Latin verb secare, "to cut."
Vocabulary lists containing transect
Unit 1: Ecological Systems
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A Cut Above: Sect, Sec
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sec, sect
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
About an hour west of Twin Lake the next day, Gilbert sat with Sam Myers, who runs a fourth-generation wheat farm that the B2H line would transect.
From Salon ● Aug. 17, 2025
These historical accounts of the landscape were "an extraordinary difference" from what Matthews observed during forest transect walks in Monte Pisano in 2014.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 26, 2024
A 35-kilometer-long transect rises from hot, steamy jungle at about 200 meters to cooler grasslands near the 4020-meter peak of Apu Kañajhuay.
From Science Magazine ● Nov. 2, 2023
She and her colleagues then walked transect lines with ultraviolet flashlights that make the powder glow.
From National Geographic ● Aug. 31, 2023
Specimens from a transect of southeastern Sonora show intergradation between Perognathus goldmani and P. artus.
From Conspecificity of two pocket mice, Perognathus goldmani and P. artus by Hall, E. Raymond (Eugene Raymond)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
