Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Death of a living organism or tissue caused or accompanied by lysis.
- noun The decomposition of organic material by living organisms, such as microorganisms.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun Dissolution of a living being; death, as the resolution of an organism into its constituent parts, and consequently the destruction of the phenomena of life.
- noun The chemical decomposition, or breaking up into simpler compounds, of organic matter, brought about by living bacterial or other minute organisms, as in the case of sewage.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Biol.) The destruction of life.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun biology The
decomposition oftissue and the subsequentdeath of theorganism - noun the decomposition of
organic material byliving organisms, especially bymicroorganisms .
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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Some academics, he writes, are working on a ... radical concept called biolysis that involves manipulating the metabolism of algae and other life-forms to release large quantities of hydrogen when they decay.
Crossing the Red Line McKibben, Bill 2004
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These processes are known to be reversible, in that some of these peculiar energies cause physico-chemical changes in their own base; the process involved I propose to call biolysis, as I propose to call biolyte the substances produced.
Manhood of Humanity. Alfred Korzybski 1914
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Reality as we know it barely continues to exist, receiving only enough vitality to keep it from biolysis.
Chabad.org Weekly Magazine [ Chukat-Balak 5769 - July 3, 2009 ] 2008
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