How to use latent in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective, noun

Latent means existing or present, but concealed or inactive. Example: “There is known latent demand for rail freight and the rail freight industry is working with Scottish businesses to develop new rail freight services, as environmental concerns are beginning to change the logistics choices of Scottish producers.”

Examples of latent by meaning

adjectiveExisting or present, but concealed or inactive.

There is known latent demand for rail freight and the rail freight industry is working with Scottish businesses to develop new rail freight services, as environmental concerns are beginning to change the logistics choices of Scottish producers.2020 August 12, Philip Haigh, “Scotland reveals 2035 decarbonisation strategy”, in Rail, page 12

nounThe residue left by a person's finger that can be made visible by a process such as powder dusting; a latent...

Once the latent prints have been visualized by the superglue and powder dusting techniques, they should be photographed again.2001, Henry C. Lee, Timothy Palmbach, Marilyn T. Miller, Henry Lee's Crime Scene Handbook, →ISBN, page 383
Paralegal workers do not argue cases in court, and these crimescene fingerprint gatherers do not compare crime-scene latents to known prints of suspects and present their findings in court.2008, Jim Fisher, Forensics Under Fire, →ISBN

nounAn underlying cause that can be inferred from statistical correlations; factor.

These kinds of latents define the invariant dispositional properties enabling prediction and control of the external environment.1975, Rudolph J. Rummel, Understanding Conflict and War, →ISBN
That is, the observed covariance between indicator y₁ and y₃ would mirror the understandable causal behavior of the corresponding underlying latents.2007, William Outhwaite, Stephen Turner, The SAGE Handbook of Social Science Methodology, →ISBN, page 166
If one were to compute the reproduced covariances among the latents of the structural model, they might be different from the covariances obtained between the same number of latents in the measurement model.2009, Stanley A. Mulaik, Linear Causal Modeling with Structural Equations, →ISBN, page 209

nounAnything that is latent.

Even if latents may not be actually detectable in any given situation, they may nevertheless be present in it.2011, Javier Cumpa, Erwin Tegtmeier, Ontological Categories, →ISBN, page 158
More and more latents have been discovered, as well as cubs.2016, Christa Wick, Alpha Curves: A BBW Shapeshifter Romance

More sentences with latent

Each gleans the structure of its respective language, developing an internal representation known as a latent space.2024 March 19, George Musser, “A Truly Intelligent Machine. [Online title and tagline: "Building Intelligent Machines Helps Us Learn How…. From the entry word cloud
The parameterization avoids the irregularities and unidentifiability of latent variable models.2015, Robin J. Evans, Thomas S. Richardson, “Smooth, identifiable supermodels of discrete DAG models with latent variables”, in arXiv. From the entry unidentifiability
There is no latent structure incarnated, no inherent skyness or lakeness in an abstract structural relation.2013, Silke Panse, “Ten Skies, 13 Lakes, 15 Pools – Structure, Immanence and Ecoasthetics in The Swimmer and James Benning's Land Films”…. From the entry skyness
The crime scene investigator has the responsibility of collecting latent fingerprints.2012, Christopher C. Harmon, Criminal Investigation, →ISBN, page 108. From the entry fingerprint
These include overpowdering a latent print and applying too much pressure when dusting the print.2011, Ross M. Gardner, Practical Crime Scene Processing and Investigation, Second Edition, page 268. From the entry overpowder
Each of these is a latent variable, which is measured by one or more observable variables.1995, J. Tague-Sutcliffe, L. Vaughan, C. Sylvain, “Using LISREL to Measure the Impact of Information on Development: London Site Pilot…. From the entry latent variable
SLRSV, being mostly latent in strawberries and other fruit crops, is of very minor importance.1992, Quarantine Pests for Europe, Wallingford, Oxfordshire: CAB International, →ISBN, page 972. From the entry mottle
Between these stages are symptomless periods of inactivity called latent periods.1981 February 14, Robert Taylor, “Stages Of Syphilis”, in Gay Community News, volume 8, number 29, page 17. From the entry symptomless
The development of latent glaucomata is usually slow and chronic, following the rhythm of primary glaucomata.1960, Premier Congrès de la Société Européenne d’Ophtalmologie, page 28. From the entry glaucoma
But by this name of cryptomnesia or resurrection of latent memories, two singularly different things are understood.1900, Th[éodore] Flournoy, “The Hindoo Cycle”, in Daniel B. Vermilye, transl., From India to the Planet Mars: A Study of a Case of…. From the entry cryptomnesia
Latent smudges may be usable to infer recently and frequently touched areas of the screen – a form of information leakage.2010 August 9, Adam J. Aviv, Katherine Gibson, Evan Mossop, Matt Blaze, Jonathan M. Smith, “Smudge Attacks on Smartphone Touch Screens”…. From the entry smudge attack
Both of them are, in fact, 'distorted' manifestations of a latent content which resides in the dreamer's unconscious.2007, Khaled Besbes, The Semiotics of Beckett's Theatre, →ISBN, page 238. From the entry oneiric
There was some languidness latent in the Nigerian atmosphere that made her forget the meaning of time passing.2005, Helen Oyeyemi, The Icarus Girl, Bloomsbury, page 70. From the entry Nigerian
I do confess a faunch for John Malkovitch, and DiCaprio should be allowed to develop his considerable latent acting abilities.1999 January 19, Kathy Routliffe, “Re: Mame”, in rec.arts.sf.fandom (Usenet), message-ID <36A3FCD4.5097D338@flash.net>. From the entry faunch
This research seemed to suggest that the product's acquired taste which they had been fuelling could also be a latent disadvantage.1998, Joe Nicholas, John Price, Advanced Studies in Media, Nelson Thornes, →ISBN, page 177. From the entry acquired taste
This latent syllabism, which underlies the alphabetism of the hieroglyphic writing, indicates with sufficient clearness the origin of the Egyptian alphabet.1995, Isaac Taylor, The Alphabet: An Account of the Origin and Development of Letters. From the entry syllabism
Thus, regardless of whether these latent or precursive psychological qualities ever succeed in achieving formal religious identity, their religiouslike influence endures.1992, Spero, Moshe HaLevi, Religious objects as psychological structures : a critical integration of object relations theory…. From the entry religiouslike
It has been the impression of past investigators that persons who malinger psychosis have latent tendencies for the condition.1984, The Psychiatric Quarterly, volume 56. From the entry malinger
Both have latent narrative appeal in their generation of tension and conflict, their unpredictability, their defiance of hierarchy and authority.1983, Wendy Griswold, “The Devil's Techniques: Cultural Legitimation and Social Change”, in American Sociological Review, volume 48…. From the entry tension
Only later were the various meanings sorted out, but they were all latent in the myth from the beginning.1960, John Macquarrie, The Scope of Demythologizing: Bultmann and His Critics, SCM Press, page 213. From the entry equiprimordial
It was concluded, therefore, that the yellow fever vaccination had activated some encephalomyelitogenic virus latent in the affected children.1956, Kenneth C. Smithburn, Yellow Fever Vaccination, World Health Organization - The Michigan University Press, page 164. From the entry encephalomyelitogenic
In the beard latent blondism is likely to come out.1931, Carleton Stevens Coon, Tribes of the Rif, page 348. From the entry blondism
Heiress of infinite hope, and dowered with latent fitness to fulfil her part, now so suddenly fallen by the wayside!1903, Tom Collins [pseudonym; Joseph Furphy], “Wed. Jan. 9th. Trinidad Pad., per Sam Young. Conclave.”, in Such is Life: Being Certain…. From the entry fall by the wayside
There is also something to be said about the latent presumption that Black intergrate and adapt the behavioural norms associated with ‘whiteness’.2018 July 27, Capital, State, Empire - The New American Way of Digital Warfare. From the entry intergrate
Furthermore, print did not usurp the role of manuscript; the magic latent in the words contained in print grimoires could be reactivated through transcription.2009, Owen Davies, “Introduction”, in Grimoires: A History of Magic Books, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 5. From the entry grimoire
On the other hand, agewise, Deb admits to being 32, while Liz, with her latent maternal reflections, sounds like she is pushing 35--advantage Pickett.2005 October 21, Ed Margolis, “Who's Debra Pickett?”, in Chicago Reader. From the entry agewise
This awareness, with all its latent power of expression in paraphenomenal events and abilities, is only another advance into the depths of Spirit.1999, Lee Irwin, Awakening to Spirit: On Life, Illumination, and Being, page 117. From the entry paraphenomenal
Human fears, needs, dreams release the latent propensities of the subliminal soul, and to respond to them the fabulating imagination sets to work.1990, Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, Tractatus Brevus, Kluwer, page 38. From the entry fabulate
If we truly want to use the decoder of an autoencoder-type structure to generate images, then we need to develop a way to organize or regularize the latent space.2021, Valliappa Lakshmanan, Martin Görner, Ryan Gillard, Practical Machine Learning for Computer Vision, O'Reilly, →ISBN. From the entry latent space
Any groupist or selfish aggression or competitiveness and so on humans naturally tend to feel is only a tendency or a latent potential, not an inevitability.2016, Kym Farrand, Morally and Otherwise Right Lives, Education and Upbringing, Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, →ISBN…. From the entry overrulable
Since the African language is latent and the European language manifest, the palimpsest is also by the same token a schizotext which further splits textual cohesion.2010, Sarah Lawall, Reading World Literature: Theory, History, Practice, page 274. From the entry schizotext
As stated earlier, in addition to having df greater than 0, the second condition for model identification is that the latent variables have to be scaled.2008, Donna Harrington, Confirmatory Factor Analysis, page 26. From the entry latent variable

Meaning of latent

adjective Existing or present, but concealed or inactive.
adjective Remaining in an inactive or hidden phase; dormant.
adjective Lying dormant or hidden until circumstances are suitable for development or manifestation.

Full definition of latent

Questions about latent in a sentence

How do you use latent in a sentence?: Latent is used as an adjective and noun. For example: “There is known latent demand for rail freight and the rail freight industry is working with Scottish businesses to develop new rail freight services, as environmental concerns are beginning to change the logistics choices of Scottish producers.”
What is a short sentence with latent?: “In the beard latent blondism is likely to come out.”
What does latent mean?: Latent means existing or present, but concealed or inactive.

Adapted from Wiktionary: latent (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this page: “How to use latent in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/latent. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.