Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • etc. See vapor, etc.

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

  • noun The gas phase component of a liquid or solid.
  • noun The gaseous state of a substance that is normally a solid or liquid.
  • verb intransitive To become vapour; to be emitted or circulated as vapour.
  • verb transitive To turn into vapour.
  • verb intransitive To use insubstantial language; to boast or bluster.
  • verb intransitive To become vapour; to be emitted or circulated as vapour.
  • verb transitive To turn into vapour.
  • verb intransitive To use insubstantial language; to boast or bluster.

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

  • noun a visible suspension in the air of particles of some substance
  • noun the process of becoming a vapor

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French, from Latin vapor ("steam, heat")

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Examples

  • If this then led to more evaporation from the oceans, causing increased cloud cover, this could be a feedback, because clouds have a number of effects: they reflect more sunlight back into space (because they are whiter than the land and ocean surfaces they cover) and they trap more of the surface heat (because water vapour is a strong greenhouse gas).

    2010 January 16 | Serendipity 2010

  • If this then led to more evaporation from the oceans, causing increased cloud cover, this could be a feedback, because clouds have a number of effects: they reflect more sunlight back into space (because they are whiter than the land and ocean surfaces they cover) and they trap more of the surface heat (because water vapour is a strong greenhouse gas).

    Initial value vs. boundary value problems | Serendipity 2010

  • If this then led to more evaporation from the oceans, causing increased cloud cover, this could be a feedback, because clouds have a number of effects: they reflect more sunlight back into space (because they are whiter than the land and ocean surfaces they cover) and they trap more of the surface heat (because water vapour is a strong greenhouse gas).

    2010 January | Serendipity 2010

  • The planet, HD 189733b, now known to have methane and water vapour is located 63 light-years away in the constellation Vulpecula, the little fox.

    Methane in space Bente Lilja Bye 2008

  • Water vapour is indeed the 'most important' greenhouse gas.

    Comments Nixed by Uncommon Descent 2007

  • The vapour is a central image because it suggests that

    The Beauty of the Medusa: A Study in Romantic Literary Iconology 1972

  • Provided that the vapour is highly rarefied, the rotation in very strong fields between the lines of the doublet can rise to - 400°.

    Pieter Zeeman - Nobel Lecture 1967

  • The phenomenon becomes far clearer once the vapour is highly rarefied.

    Pieter Zeeman - Nobel Lecture 1967

  • The refrigeration caused by the expansion brings the temperature to sink below the dew-point, and the vapour is condensed into small drops, which form together visible clouds.

    Nobel Prize in Physics 1927 - Presentation Speech 1965

  • The bridge opposite the door was wet with vapour from the bath.

    Diaries of Court Ladies of Old Japan b. 974? Murasaki Shikibu Izumi Shikibu 1920

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