1. Form a curl, curve, or kink
   "the cigar smoke curled up at the ceiling";
   - curve, kink
    
2. Twist or roll into coils or ringlets
   "curl my hair, please";
   - wave
    
3. Wind around something in coils or loops
   "The vine curled up the trellis";
   - coil, loop
    
4. Shape one's body into a curl
   "She curled farther down under the covers";
   - curl up, draw in
    
5. (sport) play the Scottish game of curling
   "They curled every weekend during the winter"

1. Lock of hair in the shape of a spiral or curl
   "He twirled a curl around his finger";
   - whorl, ringlet
    
2. A round shape formed by a series of concentric circles (as formed by leaves or flower petals)
   "The poet described the curl of rose petals unfurling";
   - coil, whorl, roll, curlicue, ringlet, gyre, scroll
    
3. (mathematics) a vector operator that describes rotation in a vector field
   "The curl of the magnetic field is proportional to the current density"

1. American chemist who with Richard Smalley and Harold Kroto discovered fullerenes and opened a new branch of chemistry (born in 1933)
   - Robert Curl, Robert F. Curl, Robert Floyd Curl Jr.

Derived forms: curled, curling, curls

Type of: bend, change surface, chemist, flex, lock, play, roll, round shape, twine, twist, wind[2], wrap

Encyclopedia: Curl, Joseph