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返回课程 ASD-STE100（简化技术英语）规则部分Rule 2.1 Write noun clusters of no more than three words.规则2.1 不要使用超过3个名词来组成名词词组。
In English, you can use one or more words to describe (or modify) a noun.

Technical texts often contain long groups of words that have the function of one part of speech in a sentence. Usually, these groups of words are made of nouns and/or adjectives and are the subject or the object in a sentence. Such word groups are known as noun clusters.


Examples:

Horizontal cylinder pivot bearing
Stainless steel corrosion protection strips

Actuator operating rod


Long noun clusters are not easy to understand because the words in the noun cluster can connect to each other in different ways. The “main”, or “head noun”, in the cluster is usually the last word of the noun cluster. When words can link up in different ways, ambiguity occurs. Thus, short noun clusters are easier to understand.


Examples:

Runway light connection

(This is a short noun cluster (3 words). The main noun is “connection.”)

Runway light connection resistance calibration

(This is a long noun cluster (5 words). The main noun is “calibration.”)


The long noun cluster in the example does not tell the reader the relation between “runway” and “calibration.” The reader must understand four modifying words to get to the main noun “calibration”.


Long noun clusters are also confusing for non-native English readers, because in some languages the main noun is the first noun in the cluster. Thus, the more words there are in a cluster, the more difficult it is to understand.


To help your reader, keep noun clusters short (a maximum of three words). To do this, you can use prepositions (for example, “of”, “on”, “in”, and, “for”) to explain the noun cluster. In STE, articles and prepositions do not count as words in a noun cluster.

Examples:

Non-STE: Runway light connection resistance calibration.
STE: Calibration of the resistance of the runway light connection.

Non-STE: Install the forward turbine overheat thermocouple terminal tags.

STE: Install the terminal tags on the forward overheat thermocouple of the turbine.

Non-STE: Remove the engine transmission housing attachment bolts.

STE: Remove the bolts that attach the transmission housing to the engine.

Non-STE: Adjust to obtain door operating rod alignment with the attachment point.

STE: Adjust the door operating rod until it aligns with the attachment point.

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