phosphorescent love

Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Shining with a faint light or luminosity like that of phosphorus; luminous without sensible heat.
  • noun A substance having the property of phosphorescence, or luminosity without heat.

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

  • adjective Shining with a phosphoric light; luminous without sensible heat.

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

  • adjective Having the property of emitting light for a period of time after the source of excitation is taken away, e.g., in electrostatic storage tubes and cathode-ray tubes.
  • noun A phosphorescent substance.

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

  • adjective emitting light without appreciable heat as by slow oxidation of phosphorous

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From phosphorus + -escent. It's interesting to note that technically phosphorus is not phosphorescent. Phosphorus is luminescent, it gives off light from a chemical reaction, as opposed to re-emission of absorbed energy (phosphorescence). (Reference: John Emsley, The Shocking History of Phosphorus, ISBN 0-330-39005-8.)

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word phosphorescent.

Examples

  • Extract from a letter by Mr. S.C. Patterson, second officer of the P. and O. steamship _Delta_: a spectacle which the _Journal_ continues to call phosphorescent:

    The Book of the Damned Charles Fort

  • Wherever it is rubbed, in the dark, on a door, or on a wall, it leaves a luminous trail of a very peculiar appearance, which has been called phosphorescent, from the name of the substance which produces it.

    The History of a Mouthful of Bread And its effect on the organization of men and animals Jean Mac�� 1854

  • Mr. Hoepfner however thinks the dispersion of the diamond by this great heat should be called a phosphorescent evaporation of it, rather than a combustion; and from its other analogies of crystallization, hardness, transparency, and place of its nativity, wishes again to replace it amongst the precious stones.

    The Botanic Garden A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: the Economy of Vegetation Erasmus Darwin 1766

  • When zinc and sulphur are hested together in close vessels the sulphur rises in vapour without t ing to the zinc; but it is staled by Mr.E. Davy, that in some ex - perimenls made in the laboratoiy of the Royal Institution, in which sulphur in vapour was passed over melted zinc, they united, and formed a white crystalline substance, analogous to the substauce found in nature, and called phosphorescent blende.

    Elements of Chemical Philosophy: Part 1, Vol.1 Humphry Davy, Sir Humphry Davy 1812

  • 'phosphorescent' - but the children are still and utterly captivated.

    Telegraph.co.uk: news, business, sport, the Daily Telegraph newspaper, Sunday Telegraph 2010

  • - to call the phosphorescent-Slurpee spill of paint on our Genesis coupe: Lime Rock Green.

    Automotive News Blog at CARandDRIVER.com - Car News Resource 2009

  • But once you start talking about washing sperm, intrauterine insemination, Microsort where they actually paint sperm with some kind of phosphorescent dye--eek, IVf, etc., that's up to you.

    Fertility Facts: Does Going to a Doctor Really Help? GreenFertility 2006

  • But once you start talking about washing sperm, intrauterine insemination, Microsort where they actually paint sperm with some kind of phosphorescent dye--eek, IVf, etc., that's up to you.

    Archive 2006-07-01 GreenFertility 2006

  • From behind his half-lowered eyelashes they shone with a kind of phosphorescent gleam — if I may so express myself — which was not the reflection of a fervid soul or of a playful fancy, but a glitter like to that of smooth steel, blinding but cold.

    A Hero of Our Time 2003

  • Waited until the light died down, then died out, leaving behind only the diagram, the lines now covered with a kind of phosphorescent slime.

    Jinx High Lackey, Mercedes 1994

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.