sharpen (something) up

sharpen | American Dictionary

sharpen
verb[ T ]
us/ˈʃɑr·pən/

sharpenverb[T] (MAKE STRONGER)

to make something stronger, or to improve something:
The dollar’s decline in value sharpened fears of another recession.
I’m taking a course that should help me sharpen my computer skills.

sharpenverb[T] (MAKE CLEARER)

to make something clearer:
Turn the knob to sharpen the focus of the slide projector.

sharpenverb[T] (MAKE SHARP)

to make something sharp or sharper:
We just had these knives/scissors sharpened.
He sharpened his pencil (= made the end used for writing come to a point).

Examples of sharpen

sharpen
Much of this research was critical, it sharpened and clarified the concepts and broke down the wide generalities of the earlier theories.
Depending on the weighting term, the tuning either sharpened or broadened, reproducing the range of behaviors we observed.
After the dura mater was excised, the pia mater was eliminated under the microscope control with a tungsten wire sharpened to 1-2 mm.
My inner eye, sharpened by the manifold appearances of a similar kind, now distinguished larger structures of various shapes.
With this method, the error is propagated and sharpened in order to finally obtain a reliable position and direction.
The interwar period, in contrast (to the earlier period) saw sharpened conflict between foreign capital and indigenous enterprise.
Although not always in agreement, they sharpened our observations and reasoning.
Averaging with respect to the leading edge considerably sharpened the gradients in the ensemble mean near the leading edge, without changing its mean position.
I think it just sharpens you up a bit.
The handaxe is a flattened tear-drop shape, but often with edges sharpened all around.
Alternatively, awareness of the meaning and implications of this violation may have sharpened during this period, with consequences for these and other symptoms.
By spelling out the differences between habits and internalized regularities in such exemplar cases, the latter concept might be sharpened.
In other words, the trade-off in relation to these policy goals were sharpened.
The latter portion of the pulse suffer s stronger self-focusing, causing a sharpened laser pulse front.
The tips of the merozoites were not as sharpened as those of the first-generation merozoites.
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