Overview of noun scan

The noun scan has 2 senses

• scan -- (the act of scanning; systematic examination of a prescribed region; "he made a thorough scan of the beach with his binoculars")


• scan, CAT scan -- (an image produced by scanning; "he analyzed the brain scan"; "you could see the tumor in the CAT scan")

Overview of verb scan

The verb scan has 7 senses

• scan -- (examine minutely or intensely; "the surgeon scanned the X-ray")


• scan, skim, rake, glance over, run down -- (examine hastily; "She scanned the newspaper headlines while waiting for the taxi")


• scan -- (make a wide, sweeping search of; "The beams scanned the night sky")


• scan -- (conform to a metrical pattern)


• scan -- (move a light beam over; in electronics, to reproduce an image)


• scan -- (read metrically; "scan verses")


• read, scan -- (obtain data from magnetic tapes; "This dictionary can be read by the computer")