placas

Placas is the plural form of placa in Spanish and Portuguese, and it refers to several related concepts that share the idea of a flat, plate‑like object or a sign used to convey information. In everyday language it most commonly denotes signs or identification plates, including license plates on vehicles and nameplates on equipment or doors.

The term also describes physical plates or sheets made of various materials, such as metal plates, ceramic tiles, or printed circuit boards (placas de circuito). In medical and biological contexts, placa appears in terms such as dental plaque (placa dental), a biofilm on teeth, and, in pathology, amyloid plaques. In geology a closely related sense is the tectonic plate, or placa tectónica, which refers to the large sections of Earth’s lithosphere that move relative to one another.

In commemorative or architectural use, a plaque is a mounted plate bearing a name, date, or tribute. The word is thus versatile, extending from everyday signs and vehicle registrations to technical objects and scientific terms.

Regional usage varies: in many Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries, placa or placa de matrícula is the license plate on a vehicle, while placas more generally can denote any plate or sheet in technical contexts. The plural form placas can appear in both casual and formal writing depending on the sense intended.