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Peak vs Trough - What's the difference?

peak | trough |

As nouns the difference between peak and trough

is that peak is a point; the sharp end or top of anything that terminates in a point; as, the peak, or front, of a cap while trough is a long, narrow container, open on top, for feeding or watering animals.

As verbs the difference between peak and trough

is that peak is to reach a highest degree or maximum while trough is to eat in a vulgar style, as if eating from a trough.

peak

English

(wikipedia peak)

Etymology 1

Noun

(en noun)
  • A point; the sharp end or top of anything that terminates in a point; as, the peak, or front, of a cap.
  • The highest value reached by some quantity in a time period.
  • The stock market reached a peak in September 1929.
  • * 2012 October 23, David Leonhardt, "[http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/us/politics/race-for-president-leaves-income-slump-in-shadows.html?_r=1&hp]," New York Times (retrieved 24 October 2012):
  • By last year, family income was 8 percent lower than it had been 11 years earlier, at its peak in 2000, according to inflation-adjusted numbers from the Census Bureau.
  • (geography) The top, or one of the tops, of a hill, mountain, or range, ending in a point; often, the whole hill or mountain, especially when isolated; as, the Peak of Teneriffe.
  • (nautical) The upper aftermost corner of a fore-and-aft sail; -- used in many combinations; as, peak-halyards, peak-brails, etc.
  • (nautical) The narrow part of a vessel's bow, or the hold within it.
  • (nautical) The extremity of an anchor fluke; the bill.
  • (mathematics) A local maximum of a function, e.g. for sine waves, each point at which the value of y is at its maximum.
  • Synonyms
    * apex, pinnacle, top, summit * See also
    Derived terms
    * peakless * peaklike * peakwise

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To reach a highest degree or maximum.
  • Historians argue about when the Roman Empire began to peak and ultimately decay.
  • To rise or extend into a peak or point; to form, or appear as, a peak.
  • * Holland
  • There peaketh up a mighty high mount.
    Synonyms
    * culminate
    Derived terms
    * off-peak

    Etymology 2

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To become sick or wan.
  • To acquire sharpness of figure or features; hence, to look thin or sickly.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Dwindle, peak , and pine.
  • To pry; to peep slyly.
  • (Shakespeare)

    Etymology 3

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • trough

    English

    (wikipedia trough)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A long, narrow container, open on top, for feeding or watering animals.
  • One of Hank's chores was to slop the pigs' trough each morning and evening.
  • Any similarly shaped container.
  • # (Australia, New Zealand) A rectangular container used for washing or rinsing clothes.
  • Ernest threw his paint brushes into a kind of trough he had fashioned from sheet metal that he kept in the sink.
  • A short, narrow canal designed to hold water until it drains or evaporates.
  • There was a small trough that the sump pump emptied into; it was filled with mosquito larvae.
  • (Canada) A gutter under the eaves of a building; an eaves trough.
  • The troughs were filled with leaves and needed clearing.
  • (agriculture, Australia, New Zealand) A channel for conveying water or other farm liquids (such as milk) from place to place by gravity; any ā€˜U’ or ā€˜V’ cross-sectioned irrigation channel.
  • A long, narrow depression between waves or ridges; the low portion of a wave cycle.
  • The buoy bobbed between the crests and troughs of the waves moving across the bay.
    The neurologist pointed to a troubling trough in the pattern of his brain-waves.
  • (meteorology) A linear atmospheric depression associated with a weather front.
  • Verb

    (en verb)
  • To eat in a vulgar style, as if eating from a trough
  • he troughed his way through 3 meat pies.

    References

    * Oxford English Dictionary Online

    See also

    * crib * ditch * trench