How to Use puzzle over in a Sentence

puzzle over

phrasal verb

• Soon enough, Poirot and Oliver have fresh corpses to puzzle over.
  — Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune, 14 Sep. 2023
• They were forced to puzzle over topographic maps so old that some dated to the Civil War.
  — Lizzie Johnson and Lauren Tierney, Anchorage Daily News, 27 July 2023
• Teams of lawyers studied the watch’s provenance and puzzled over how to offer it for sale without raising eyebrows.
  — Jay Fielden, The New Yorker, 17 June 2024
• If that’s true, scientists are still left puzzling over how the four rhopalia work together to make up a functioning, brain-like system.
  — Sarah Kuta, Smithsonian Magazine, 25 Sep. 2023
• For decades, scientists have puzzled over what geologic engine is at work that brings heat from the Earth’s core to cause these eruptions.
  — Darren Orf, Popular Mechanics, 1 June 2023
• His team puzzled over the stuck fasteners and the limitations posed by the container’s quarantine in a sealed box.
  — Daniel Wu, Washington Post, 31 Jan. 2024
• In Oregon, rural school districts have puzzled over how to provide enough housing for teachers.
  — Rachel Siegel, Washington Post, 18 Nov. 2023
• For years, astronomers have puzzled over why Uranus is tinted green during its solstices but radiates a bluer glow at its equinoxes.
  — Becky Ferreira, New York Times, 4 Jan. 2024
• Lying in his bunk at night — a 2-inch thick mattress and a pillow made of a blanket folded inside a T-shirt — Armstrong puzzles over his life: how the most unlikely place — jail and prison — opened his heart.
  — Thomas Curwen, Los Angeles Times, 13 Dec. 2023
• Analysts puzzled over the data, with some wondering whether Italy’s agreement to join the BRI might finally be paying off.
  — Nicholas Gordon, Fortune, 31 July 2023
• Archaeologists have long puzzled over the prominence of the hamadryas baboon in ancient Egyptian culture.
  — Nathaniel J. Dominy, Scientific American, 1 Nov. 2021
• Yet economists puzzle over why people can feel so down but continue to spend big on vacations, concert tickets and dining out.
  — Rachel Siegel, Washington Post, 14 Nov. 2023
• Scientists are puzzled over what's causing hundreds of fish to wash up dead in South Florida, including an endangered species native to the region.
  — Julia Jacobo, ABC News, 29 Mar. 2024
• After puzzling over them for a few days, Mama took me a few towns over to see an albularyo, an animistic healer who could reverse illnesses caused by the taong-lupa surrounding all of us.
  — Geena Rocero, SELF, 26 June 2023
• Fiorito, a 44-year-old attorney, puzzled over the home’s decrepit status and why the seller was the nonprofit Habitat for Humanity.
  — Erika Mailman, WSJ, 4 Jan. 2024
• The trailer opens with Rustin (played by Colman Domingo) puzzling over the logistics for an ambitiously large-scale demonstration—organized over just eight weeks.
  — Teresa Nowakowski, Smithsonian Magazine, 28 Aug. 2023
• In recent years, scientists have puzzled over a particular class of transients – bursts of intense X-rays and light shot from distant galactic centers.
  — Matt Hrodey, Discover Magazine, 12 Sep. 2023
• The rest of the scene plays out with the advice-giving nanny frantically explaining not to use gas, or coconut oil, on a baby’s diaper zone, while Bajos’ character puzzles over what to slather on her tiny ward.
  — WIRED, 1 Nov. 2023
• Hammett fans have long puzzled over this enigmatic digression.
  — Patrick Radden Keefe, The New Yorker, 25 Dec. 2023
• People can also puzzle over this film’s casting of two controversial actors: Vincent Gallo and James Franco.
  — Martha Ross, The Mercury News, 17 Jan. 2024
• For a century, physiologists have puzzled over how the body coordinates the switch between storage and release.
  — Emily Underwood, Smithsonian Magazine, 5 June 2024
• But the people with the power to free him keep puzzling over his crimes, demanding explanations, psychological insight, the thinnest ray of sunlight on his motivations.
  — Christopher Goffard, Los Angeles Times, 15 May 2024
• The development comes after scientists have spent years studying the skull and puzzling over its combination of archaic and modern features.
  — Matt Hrodey, Discover Magazine, 11 Aug. 2023
• On Reddit and elsewhere online, Instacart workers puzzle over how Instacart computer algorithms determine what each job pays or direct them to stores far away.
  — Shira Ovide, Washington Post, 22 Sep. 2023
• Both have puzzled over Nietzsche and considered the meaningless meaningfulness of life.
  — Casey Cep, The New Yorker, 3 July 2023
• While predictions about the possibility of this particular effect date back to 2011, theorists are still puzzling over the new discovery.
  — Daniel Garisto, Quanta Magazine, 29 May 2024
• For years, reporters have puzzled over one of Washington’s most pressing mysteries: What does Kyrsten Sinema actually believe?
  — Alex Shephard, The New Republic, 2 May 2023
• But crushing a struggling animal restricts these muscles, and scientists have long puzzled over how the snakes survive this constriction contradiction.
  — Lars Fischer, Scientific American, 1 July 2022
• In the past year or so, analysts have puzzled over why public sentiment about the economy has remained so negative despite inflation falling, G.D.P. growing steadily, and wages rising faster than prices since last summer.
  — John Cassidy, The New Yorker, 22 Jan. 2024
• Psephologists in the United States have long puzzled over the demographic moment when a younger generation of voters will form the single most important critical mass in American elections.
  — Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 17 May 2023

Last Updated: 6 Sep 2024