Scan - Definition

n 1: the act of scanning; systematic examination of a prescribed
region; "he made a thorough scan of the beach with his
binoculars"
2: an image produced by scanning; "he analyzed the brain scan";
"you could see the tumor in the CAT scan" [syn: scan, CAT
scan]
v 1: examine minutely or intensely; "the surgeon scanned the
X-ray"
2: examine hastily; "She scanned the newspaper headlines while
waiting for the taxi" [syn: scan, skim, rake, glance
over, run down]
3: make a wide, sweeping search of; "The beams scanned the night
sky"
4: conform to a metrical pattern
5: move a light beam over; in electronics, to reproduce an image
6: read metrically; "scan verses"
7: obtain data from magnetic tapes; "This dictionary can be read
by the computer" [syn: read, scan]