bypass

The definition of a bypass is a secondary connection that goes around the main route or that provides an alternative means of arriving at a destination, or a surgical procedure designed to provide an alternative route.

(noun)

  1. A street designed to let you drive over the highway and skip the highway traffic is an example of a bypass.
  2. A surgery performed to create a different path for blood to travel to the heart after your arteries get blocked is an example of a bypass.

To bypass is to provide an alternative way around, or to get around something.

(verb)

If you take a shortcut to avoid traffic, this is an example of a time when you bypass traffic.

YourDictionary definition and usage example. Copyright © 2013 by LoveToKnow Corp.

See bypass in Webster's New World College Dictionary

noun

  1. a way, path, etc. between two points that avoids or is auxiliary to the main way; specif., an alternative highway route, as for skirting an urban area
  2. a pipe or channel providing an auxiliary passage for gas or liquid, as that leading to the pilot light in a gas stove
  3. Elec. shunt ()
    1. a surgical operation to provide passage for a fluid, as blood, around a diseased or blocked part or organ
    2. such a passage

transitive verb

  1. to go around instead of through; use a bypass to avoid
  2. to furnish with a bypass
  3. to ignore, fail to consult, etc.

See bypass in American Heritage Dictionary 4

also by-pass

noun
  1. A highway or section of a highway that passes around an obstructed or congested area.
  2. A pipe or channel used to conduct gas or liquid around another pipe or a fixture.
  3. A means of circumvention.
  4. Electricity See shunt.
  5. Medicine
    a. An alternative passage created surgically to divert the flow of blood or other bodily fluid or circumvent an obstructed or diseased organ.
    b. A surgical procedure to create such a channel: a coronary artery bypass; a gastric bypass.
transitive verb by·passed also by-passed, by·pass·ing also by-pass·ing, by·pass·es also by-pass·es
  1. To avoid (an obstacle) by using an alternative channel, passage, or route.
  2. To be heedless of; ignore: bypassed standard office procedures.
  3. To channel (piped liquid, for example) through a bypass.

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