strobe

plural strobes

1. A stroboscopic lamp: a device used to produce regular flashes of light.

   White all light sources illuminate the subject, the strobe both illuminates and "freezes" the subject.

   2006, Michael Grecco, Lighting and the Dramatic Portrait, Amphoto Books, →ISBN, page 59

2. A pulse of light, such as from a flashing or rotating light source.

   From somewhere behind him came a strobe of light, then he heard a car door slam.

   2019 October 8, Deborah Crombie, A Bitter Feast: A Novel, HarperCollins, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   "The strobe from the lighthouse came into the window and lit up the wall behind my crib."

   2002 January 1, Charles Waugh, Martin Greenberg, Lighthouse Hauntings, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 158

   A strobe swept across, and light flashed from a sparkly top he'd never seen before.

   2026 July 14, April Richardson, The Hidden Crown Legacy: Dark Romance

3. computingAn electronic signal in hardware indicating that a value is ready to be read.

   a memory strobe; a data strobe

present singular third person strobes · participle present strobing · participle past strobed · past strobed

1. To flash like a stroboscopic lamp.

   Here was a blazingly erotic sex star par excellence as Travolta gyrated around that strobing disco dance floor like a cock-o'-the-walk.

   1986, Sam Frank, Sex in the Movies

   2 more examples

   ... as they fuck she quakes, body strobing miles beneath him in cream and night-blue, all sound suppressed, eyes in crescents behind gold lashes...

   1973, Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

   The problem was that when running cables the entire length of the tunnel, engineers had to take into account any voltage drop to ensure no lights strobe - something that could cause serious issues for drivers running at high speeds.

   2023 November 29, Peter Plisner, “The winds of change in Catesby Tunnel”, in RAIL, number 997, page 58