in phonetics, this refers to the articulation of a stop consonant with n accompanying sudden plosive burst of air. In English the consonants p, f, and k are aspirated at the beginning of a syllable but not at the end. The difference can be experienced by placing a finger close to one’s mouth and saying pot (aspirated) and then noting the difference between this and top and spot (unaspirated),
ASPIRATION: “Aspiration refers to whether a plosive sound can be heard at the beginning of a phoneme (as in pot).”