tube vs tunnel

tube

noun
  • Anything that is hollow and cylindrical in shape. 

  • The London Underground railway system, originally referred to the lower level lines that ran in tubular tunnels as opposed to the higher ones which ran in rectangular section tunnels. (Often the tube.) 

  • A television. Compare cathode ray tube and picture tube. 

  • A tin can containing beer. 

  • An approximately cylindrical container, usually with a crimped end and a screw top, used to contain and dispense semiliquid substances. 

  • An idiot. 

  • A wave which pitches forward when breaking, creating a hollow space inside. 

verb
  • To supply with, or enclose in, a tube. 

  • To intubate. 

  • To ride an inner tube. 

tunnel

noun
  • Anything that resembles a tunnel. 

  • An underground or underwater passage. 

  • A passage through or under some obstacle. 

  • A hole in the ground made by an animal, a burrow. 

  • A level passage driven across the measures, or at right angles to veins which it is desired to reach; distinguished from the drift, or gangway, which is led along the vein when reached by the tunnel. 

  • The opening of a chimney for the passage of smoke; a flue. 

  • A wrapper for a protocol that cannot otherwise be used because it is unsupported, blocked, or insecure. 

  • A vessel with a broad mouth at one end, a pipe or tube at the other, for conveying liquor, fluids, etc., into casks, bottles, or other vessels; a funnel. 

verb
  • To make a tunnel through or under something; to burrow. 

  • To transmit something through a tunnel (wrapper for insecure or unsupported protocol). 

  • To insert a catheter into a vein to allow long-term use. 

  • To undergo the quantum-mechanical phenomenon where a particle penetrates through a barrier that it classically cannot surmount. 

  • To dig a tunnel. 

How often have the words tube and tunnel occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )