# fibre

Pronunciation: UK/AUS say "FY-buh" /ˈfaɪ.bə(ɹ)/; US say "FY-bur" /ˈfaɪbɚ/

## Noun

1. Material made up of long, thin strands, thought of as a mass or substance rather than as single pieces.
   - Simple: Material that is made up of lots of long, thin strands.
   - _The cushions are stuffed with polyester fibre that keeps its shape after washing._
   - _Coconut fibre is woven into tough doormats that last for years._
2. A long, slender strand of a material, often one of many twisted together to make thread.
   - Simple: One long, thin strand of a material, often twisted together with others to make thread.
   - _Police matched a single fibre from the victim's coat to the boot of the suspect's car._
   - _The wool fibres are washed and combed before they are spun into yarn._
3. The indigestible part of plant foods such as vegetables, considered as an element of a person's diet.
   - Simple: The part of food from plants, like vegetables, that your body cannot digest.
   - _Wholemeal pasta and lentils are easy ways to get more fibre into your diet._
   - _She switched to a high-fibre breakfast cereal on her GP's advice._
4. Broadband internet delivered using optical-fibre cables for all or part of the connection to a home or business, or the service providing it.
   - Simple: A fast internet connection using cables carrying light for some or all of its route, or the service itself.
   - _The village was among the last in the county to get full fibre, and residents can now work from home without dropped video calls._
   - _The small business switched to fibre last year, and uploads that once took hours now finish in minutes._
5. Any of the long, thread-like cells or structures found in body tissue, such as muscle cells, nerve axons, or strands of collagen.
   - Simple: One of the long, thin cells or threads in your body, like those in muscles or nerves.
   - _A single muscle fibre may contain hundreds of nuclei along its length._
   - _Damaged fibres in the heart muscle are slowly replaced by scar tissue._
6. Inner strength of character, together with the determination to hold firm to what is right.
   - Simple: Strength of character that helps you stay firm and do what is right.
   - _Critics said the committee lacked the moral fibre to stand up to its wealthiest donors._
   - _Bringing up four children alone after the accident took real moral fibre._

## Other meanings

- (noun) In mathematics, everything in a map's domain that the map sends to one chosen point of its range; in category theory, the pullback of a morphism along a global element.
- (noun) In computing, a lighter form of thread: a single sequence of a program's instructions that costs less to start and to switch between than an ordinary thread.

## Origin

From French fibre, from Old French, from Latin fibra.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/fibre (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).