crackle

Etymology

crack +‎ -le (“early modern English frequentative suffix”). The physics sense is part of a facetious sequence "snap, crackle, pop", after the mascots of Rice Krispies cereal.

Pronunciation

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -ækəl

Noun

crackle (plural crackles)

1. A fizzing, popping sound.
2. (pottery) A style of glaze giving the impression of many small cracks.
3. (physics) The fifth derivative of the position vector with respect to time (after velocity, acceleration, jerk, and jounce), i.e. the rate of change of jounce.

Verb

crackle (third-person singular simple present crackles, present participle crackling, simple past and past participle crackled)

1. (intransitive) To make a fizzing, popping sound.

   a crackling fire

   • Dryden

     the unknown ice that crackles underneath them

Derived terms

• crackling

Anagrams

• cackler, clacker