How to Use phonon in a Sentence

phonon

noun
  • In a solid wire, phonons move freely like open highway traffic.
    — Mrigakshi Dixit, Interesting Engineering, 23 June 2026
  • But the qubit is way too sensitive to tiny vibrations called phonons.
    — Chris Lee, Ars Technica, 20 Sep. 2018
  • These heated surroundings can then pass heat back to the cooler in the form of phonons.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 12 Sep. 2023
  • The presence of phonons, of course, affects those lattices’s dipole moments as well.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 17 Feb. 2023
  • Simply put, just like photons are quantized light waves, phonons are quantized sound waves.
    — Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 30 Mar. 2026
  • These slots acted as tiny metallic traps for light, tuning it to the frequency of the phonons.
    — Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 30 Sep. 2025
  • The researchers were looking for the coupling between electrons and a type of sound wave, called a phonon.
    — Chris Lee, Ars Technica, 6 Sep. 2019
  • The energy from these bounces create tiny vibrations known as phonons.
    — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 20 Aug. 2019
  • When laser power becomes strong enough in optical fibers, the light can interact with phonons.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 6 Dec. 2023
  • These phonons can pile up at the boundary between materials, resisting the flow of heat.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 20 Oct. 2025
  • These phonons create feedback in the form of tiny acoustic waves, which in turn interrupt the original light waves.
    — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 20 Aug. 2019
  • In silicon, electrons have to emit a photon and a sound vibration (a phonon) at the same time to reach the valence band.
    — Chris Lee, Ars Technica, 22 July 2019
  • The new study explores a unique approach to making SAWs using a phonon laser.
    — Mrigakshi Dixit, Interesting Engineering, 14 Jan. 2026
  • This means detecting one phonon as having been transmitted or reflected forces the other phonon to be in the same state.
    — Andrew N. Cleland, The Conversation, 5 July 2023
  • Collectively, these vibrations make a sound, referred to as phonons.
    — Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 10 June 2026
  • In certain crystals, vibrations called phonons can now merge with light waves to form entirely new hybrid states of matter.
    — Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 30 Sep. 2025
  • However, the phonons in the nanopillars are standing waves, pinned by the walls of the columns much the way a vibrating guitar string is held fixed at both ends.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 5 June 2023
  • When a group of atomic nuclei vibrate, their collective excitation is instead called a phonon.
    — Daniel Garisto, Scientific American, 9 June 2020
  • The team used Raman spectroscopy, a technique that measures vibrational modes, to study how phonons interfere.
    — Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 11 Aug. 2025
  • The result was the appearance of three distinct hybrid quantum states known as phonon-polaritons, the new blends of vibration and light.
    — Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 30 Sep. 2025
  • The bead can hold units of vibrational energy called phonons, which behave somewhat analogously to photons.
    — John Timmer, Ars Technica, 31 Jan. 2020
  • Another major source of phonons, collisions with air molecules, was reduced by pulling a vacuum.
    — John Timmer, Ars Technica, 31 Jan. 2020
  • This, in turn, changes the way the material diffracts the stroboscopic bright-field electron stream, revealing the phonon’s progress.
    — Douglas McCormick, IEEE Spectrum, 19 Apr. 2016
  • Physicists have discovered an entire zoo of quasiparticles in solid materials with names such as phonons, magnons, spinons, holons and plasmons.
    — Douglas Natelson, Scientific American, 19 Mar. 2024
  • By tuning phonons, scientists have also found a way to influence the structure and behavior of materials.
    — Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 10 June 2026
  • The interaction, called dislocation–phonon drag, can greatly strengthen the metal.
    — Georgina Jedikovska, Interesting Engineering, 12 Jan. 2026
  • The vibrations are the interactions that occur between electrons and phonons, which are the two main elementary particles in solids.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 3 May 2016
  • Instead of knocking excitons around, phonons in this molecule bind to them to create a new quasiparticle that flow freely through the semiconductor at twice the speed of electrons.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 26 Dec. 2023
  • The tubes are only around 10–20 nm wide, with a lot of empty space, which means there is very little material for vibrations (phonons) to travel through.
    — Christopher McFadden, Interesting Engineering, 30 Aug. 2025
  • In solid materials, these vibrations travel as quasiparticles known as phonons.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 5 June 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'phonon.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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