sublimate

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. Chemistry To cause (a solid or gas) to change state without becoming a liquid.
2. v. To modify the natural expression of (a primitive, instinctual impulse) in a socially acceptable manner.
3. v. To divert the energy associated with (an unacceptable impulse or drive) into a personally and socially acceptable activity.
4. v. Chemistry To transform directly from the solid to the gaseous state or from the gaseous to the solid state without becoming a liquid.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To bring (a solid substance, such as camphor or sulphur) by heat into the state of vapor, which on cooling returns again to the solid state. See sublimation.
2. To extract by or as by sublimation.
3. Figuratively, to deprive of earthly dross; elevate; refine; purify; idealize.
4. Brought into a state of vapor by heat, and again condensed, as camphor, sulphur, etc.; hence, elevated; purified.
5. n. Anything produced by sublimation or refining.
6. n. In mineralogy, the deposit formed, as in a glass tube or on a surface of charcoal, when a mineral containing a volatile ingredient is heated before the blowpipe.

Wiktionary

1. v. To change state from a solid to a gas (or from a gas to a solid) without passing through the liquid state (transitive or intransitive)
2. v. To purify or refine a substance through such a change of state.
3. v. To modify the natural expression of a sexual or primitive instinct in a socially acceptable manner; to divert the energy of such an instinct into some acceptable activity.
4. v. To raise to a place of honor.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. To bring by heat into the state of vapor, which, on cooling, returns again to the solid state.
2. v. To refine and exalt; to heighten; to elevate.
3. v. To redirect the energy (of sexual or other biological drives) into a more socially acceptable or constructive form.
4. n. A product obtained by sublimation; hence, also, a purified product so obtained.
5. adj. Brought into a state of vapor by heat, and again condensed as a solid.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. the product of vaporization of a solid
2. adj. made pure
3. v. direct energy or urges into useful activities
4. v. vaporize and then condense right back again
5. v. make more subtle or refined
6. v. change or cause to change directly from a solid into a vapor without first melting
7. v. remove impurities from, increase the concentration of, and separate through the process of distillation