Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Luminous at night. Used especially of certain high clouds.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Shining by night or in the dark; nuctilucid: as, the noctilucent eyes of a cat.
Wiktionary
- adj. meteorology Shining or glowing at night, especially of very high-altitude clouds that reflect sunlight long after sunset.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. shining or glowing by night
Examples
“That route saves fuel and avoids high-altitude ice clouds, called noctilucent clouds, that form during the summer between 50 degrees and 70 degrees north and south of the equator.”
“The clouds are intended to simulate naturally-occurring phenomena called noctilucent clouds, which are the highest clouds in the atmosphere.”
“Scientists claim these "noctilucent" clouds -- formations that are similar to what was seen after the Tunguska event -- reach the poles because water vapor appears to be quickly traveling in two dimensions, rather than three.”
“noctilucent" clouds have become more common in the past 50 years.”
“Look for the Plough in the NW, the Square of Pegasus in the E, and remain on the alert for noctilucent clouds above the NW to NE horizon, perhaps near Capella in Auriga.”
“Noguchi sent down other beautiful shots, including “priceless” noctilucent clouds above Antarctica, city lights above Tokyo, and Port-Au-Prince, Haiti with “prayers” from the crew.”
ISS Crew Twitpics from Orbit; Live Streaming Video Soon ! | Universe Today
“The noctilucent or “night-shining” clouds are at an altitude of 47 to 53 miles (76 to 85 km), where meteors and bright aurora lights are not uncommon and the atmosphere gives way to the blackness of space.”
Strange Clouds Spotted at the Edge of Space | Disinformation
“As the sun rose in the morning, remnants of the explosion were visible as noctilucent clouds over the region.”
“The experiment created a man-made noctilucent cloud using the fourth stage of a NASA Black Brant XII suborbital sounding rocket that spewed exhaust particles 173 miles 278 km above Earth.”
“During that time we observed radar soundings consistent with noctilucent clouds.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘noctilucent’.
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Gene Wolfe
Please contribute your favorite words from any of Gene Wolfe’s books to this prize-winning list.
In case you come across words in this list which are too commonplace to fit in, please ...gallipot, roost, badelaire, oblesque, execration, dhole, amschaspand, arctother, chalcedony, penitence, asimi, autarch and 839 more...
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Words
phantasmagoria, eviscerate, avast, simulacrum, varicose, oblique, gestalt, ersatz, vernal, vivace, stellate, synecdoche and 330 more...
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phrontistery - n
from phrontistery.info
nacarat, nacelle, nacket, nacre, nacreous, naevus, naiant, nail, nainsook, naissant, nanism, nanization and 340 more...
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250 Cherry-Picked Words
Juicy words for the intermediate and advanced speller
consomme, miniaceous, nankeen, smaragdine, stramineous, vitellary, allemande, beguine, bransle, charabanc, margaritaceous, chaconne and 238 more...
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250 Further Spelling Words
Another compilation of spelling words suitable for intermediate to advanced spellers.
venturi, aesir, affenpinscher, rottweiler, amanuensis, balletomane, hansard, sangfroid, yukata, capriccio, cuisse, heriot and 237 more...
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Clouds
We owe our current names for clouds to Luke Howard. Wikipedia tells us that "Howard was not the first to attempt a classification of clouds—Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744–1829) had earlier proposed a ...
wane-cloud, stratus, cirrostratus, cirro-stratus, strato-cirrus, altostratus, salmon-cloud, cumulus, altocumulus lenti..., sonder-cloud, rain-cloud, nimbostratus and 205 more...
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♗
euonym, eidolon, aurulent, sable-vested, aether, seraph, woodwose, je ne sais quoi, silver-tongued, schadenfreude, cri de coeur, mare's nest and 10 more...
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adjectives
amort, propense, aguish, seclusive, pokerish, horrent, stem-winding, indign, obzocky, abnormous, fallow, dividuous and 39 more...
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Ecology
apishamore, argonaut, latent, unbacked, dichotomy, noctilucent, assoil, animalcule, succinct, vespertine, crozzle, vermilion and 15 more...
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Slam Fodder
Those words that will inevitable end up in a Slam Poem
feel free to challenge me!:)bumptious, gamekeeper, slamily, burbuliatorius, cryptomnesia, paradox, pulchritudinous, mimetic, anhedonia, skelf, rampike, furlough and 84 more...
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+o +u
O before U.
noctilucent, noctilucin, noctilucous, noctua, noctuid, globular, glout, gomuti, gossypium, goura, gourami, goulash and 25 more...
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♥
ambrosia, inamorata, gossamer, lily-white, hummingbird, roucoulement, poppy, daisy, calypso, lunula, lamb, dove and 1526 more...
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adj. + adv.
vainglorious, lanuginous, altiloquent, ambisextrous, desiderative, flothery, liquescent, logoed, autotelic, tropology, erotogenic, crocky and 108 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, N
nurdled, naumachia, nystagmus, nephology, nigh, noctilucent, noctambulant, nocebo, neap, napiform, nacelle, node and 95 more...
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exlotuseater's Words
autocthonous, anacoluthon, benthic, bactrian, caryatid, chiastic, dryad, dromedary, effulgent, elixir, fricative, fungible and 145 more...
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anaeli's list
Enthralled by the beauty of language
Tweets
Looking for tweets for noctilucent.
crystalcrystal Can this be used this to describe a person? Because i'm going to use it for that today.
Mar 9, 2012
reesetee That is a nice name. :-) Apr 17, 2008
Prolagus There is also a bioluminescent jellyfish named Pelagia noctiluca. I love that name. Apr 17, 2008
reesetee My brain wants this word to be "nocticulent." Apr 17, 2008
quotato NIGHT-SHINING CLOUDS: NASA's AIM spacecraft left Earth Wednesday on a two-year mission to study mysterious noctilucent (night-shining) clouds. Hovering at the edge of space, these clouds were first noticed in the 19th century; they are remarkable for their electric-blue color and sharp, wavy ripples. In recent years noctilucent clouds have been growing brighter and spreading. What causes them? Theories range from space dust to global warming. For the next two years, AIM will scrutinize the clouds from Earth orbit to learn what they may be telling us about our planet. Apr 26, 2007