Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The group of natural processes, including weathering, dissolution, abrasion, corrosion, and transportation, by which material is worn away from the earth's surface.
  • noun The process of eroding or the condition of being eroded.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The act or operation of eating or gnawing away.
  • noun Hence The act of wearing away by any means.
  • noun In zoology, the abrasion or wearing away of a surface or margin, as if by gnawing; the state of being erose; the act of eroding.
  • noun In geology, the wearing away of rocks by water and other agencies of geological change.
  • noun The state of being eaten or worn away; corrosion; canker; ulceration.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act or operation of eroding or eating away.
  • noun The state of being eaten away; corrosion; canker.
  • noun The wearing away of the earth's surface by any natural process. The chief agent of erosion is running water; minor agents are glaciers, the wind, and waves breaking against the coast.
  • noun fig. a gradual reduction or lessening as if by an erosive force.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable The result of having been being worn away or eroded, as by a glacier on rock or the sea on a cliff face.
  • noun uncountable The changing of a surface by mechanical action, friction, thermal expansion contraction, or impact.
  • noun uncountable Destruction by abrasive action of fluids.
  • noun mathematics, image processing One of two fundamental operations in morphological image processing from which all other morphological operations are derived.
  • noun dentistry Loss of tooth enamel due to non-bacteriogenic chemical processes.
  • noun medicine A shallow ulceration or lesion, usually involving skin or epithelial tissue.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a gradual decline of something
  • noun erosion by chemical action
  • noun (geology) the mechanical process of wearing or grinding something down (as by particles washing over it)
  • noun condition in which the earth's surface is worn away by the action of water and wind

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin ērōsiō, ērōsiōn-, an eating away, from ērōsus, eaten away; see erose.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin erosio ("eating away"), derived from erodere, possibly via erosionem and Middle French erosion.

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Examples

Comments

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  • What is the opposite of this word?

    March 31, 2009

  • ...accretion?

    March 31, 2009