Noun

(en noun)

A violent release of energy (sometimes mechanical, nuclear, or chemical.)

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-21, author= Chico Harlan

, volume=189, issue=2, page=30, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Japan pockets the subsidy … , passage=Across Japan, technology companies and private investors are racing to install devices that until recently they had little interest in: solar panels. Massive solar parks are popping up as part of a rapid build-up that one developer likened to an "explosion ."}}

A bursting due to pressure.

The sound of an explosion.

A sudden uncontrolled increase.

*

As with the Lejeuneaceae, this pattern of massive speciation appears to be correlated with the Cretaceous explosion of the angiosperms and the simultaneous creation of a host of new microenvironments, differing in humidity, light intensity, texture, etc.

A sudden outburst.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist)

, title= Can China clean up fast enough? , passage=All this has led to an explosion of protest across China, including among a middle class that has discovered nimbyism. That worries the government, which fears that environmental activism could become the foundation for more general political opposition. It is therefore dealing with pollution in two ways—suppression and mitigation.}}

Noun

(uncountable) The process by which an organism produces others of its kind; breeding, propagation, procreation, reproduction.

(countable) The act of increasing or rising; augmentation, amplification, enlargement, escalation, aggrandizement.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-19, author= Mark Tran

, volume=189, issue=6, page=1, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Denied an education by war , passage=One particularly damaging, but often ignored, effect of conflict on education is the proliferation of attacks on schools

(countable) The result of building up; buildup, accretion.

(uncountable) The spread of biochemical, nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction to countries not originally involved in developing them.