shunt

Meaning

Verb

1. To cause to move (suddenly), as by pushing or shoving; to give a (sudden) start to.
2. To divert to a less important place, position, or state.
3. To provide with a shunt.
4. To move data in memory to a physical disk.
5. To divert electric current by providing an alternative path.
6. To move a train from one track to another, or to move carriages, etc. from one train to another.
7. (informal) To have a minor collision, especially in a motor car.
8. To divert the flow of a body fluid.
9. (obsolete) To turn aside or away; to divert.
10. To carry on arbitrage between the London stock exchange and provincial stock exchanges.

Noun

1. An act of moving (suddenly), as due to a push or shove.
2. A connection used as an alternative path between parts of an electrical circuit.
3. The shifting of the studs on a projectile from the deep to the shallow sides of the grooves in its discharge from a shunt gun.
4. An abnormal passage between body channels.
5. A passage between body channels constructed surgically as a bypass; a tube inserted into the body to create such a passage.
6. A switch on a railway used to move a train from one track to another.
7. (informal) A minor collision between vehicles.

Synonyms

bypass

divert

switch

shift

turn

electrical shunt

deflect

avert

swerve

branch

by-passing

crash

depart

digress

distributary

drill

eschew

exchange

feeder road

interchange

lead off

leg

🦵

multiple

parallel

parallel connection

paralleling

replace

shelter

shunt circuit

sidetrack

side-track

substitute

swap

switch over

swop

tap

transfer

transition

turn away

turn-out

waylay

yaw

branch off

side-way

down pipe

shunt connection

angle tee

subcircuit

shunt off

split-flow

shunt current

by-pass channel

by-pass tube

connection in parallel

in-bridge

install in parallel

stub arm

pass-by circuitous

by-pas sage

by-pass conduit

aberrate

by-pass pipe

abreast

abridge

barter away

bend

branch circuit

bridging

bypath

change

commute

convert

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ʃʌnt/

Etymology

From Middle English shunten, schunten, schonten, schounten, shont, shonte, shount, shounten, shunte (“to move rapidly or suddenly, jerk; to swerve, turn away; to avoid, dodge, escape, evade”), either:
* possibly a back-formation from Middle English shǒnen (“to decline to do, refuse; to abandon, forsake; to disdain, dislike, hate; to avoid, escape; to be afraid, fear; to be wary of”), from Old English sċunian, sċyniġan; see shun. Or
* an alteration of Middle English shunden, *schunden, *schinden, from Old English sċyndan, sċendan (“to hasten, hurry”) (as in āsċyndan (“to remove, take away”), from Proto-West Germanic *skundijan, from Proto-Germanic *skundijaną (“to compel, drive, push; to accelerate, rush, speed up”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kew(n)t- (“to rattle, shake”).
* from unrecorded Old English *sċunettan, a derivative of sċunian (“to shun, avoid”).
The English word is cognate with Danish skynde (“to hasten, hurry, speed”), Icelandic skynda, skunda (“to hasten”), Middle High German schünden (“to compel; to urge; to irritate”), Norwegian skynde (“to hurry, rush”), Swedish skynda (“to hasten, hurry; to scuttle, scurry”). Outside Germanic, compare Sanskrit स्कन्दति (skándati, “to dart, leap, spring, spurt or burst forth, ejaculate, assail, drop, split”), Albanian shkund (“to shake; to swig”).
As regards the noun sense, compare Middle English shunt (“swerve; sudden jerk”), derived from the verb.