名词

1. 脊柱
Your backbone is the column of small linked bones down the middle of your back.

2. 中坚力量；骨干；支柱
The backbone of an organization or system is the part of it that gives it its main strength.

3. 骨气；勇气
If you say that someone has no backbone, you think they do not have the courage to do things which need to be done.

1. the part of a network that connects other networks together

e.g. the backbone is the part of a communication network that carries the heaviest traffic

2. the part of a book's cover that encloses the inner side of the book's pages and that faces outward when the book is shelved

e.g. the title and author were printed on the spine of the book

Synonym: spine

3. fortitude and determination

e.g. he didn't have the guts to try it

Synonym: gritgutsmoxiesandgumption

4. the series of vertebrae forming the axis of the skeleton and protecting the spinal cord

e.g. the fall broke his back

Synonym: spinal columnvertebral columnspinebackrachis

5. a central cohesive source of support and stability

e.g. faith is his anchor
the keystone of campaign reform was the ban on soft money
he is the linchpin of this firm

Synonym: anchormainstaykeystonelinchpinlynchpin