| / English Dictionary |
ICY
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
Irregular inflected forms: icier , iciest
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Covered with or containing or consisting of ice
Example:
icy northern waters
Classified under:
Similar:
frozen (turned into ice; affected by freezing or by long and severe cold)
Derivation:
ice (a rink with a floor of ice for ice hockey or ice skating)
iciness (coldness due to a cold environment)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Shiny and slick as with a thin coating of ice
Example:
roads and trees glazed with an icy film
Classified under:
Similar:
glazed; shiny (having a shiny surface or coating)
Derivation:
iciness (coldness due to a cold environment)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Extremely cold
Example:
polar weather
Synonyms:
arctic; frigid; gelid; glacial; icy; polar
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
cold (having a low or inadequate temperature or feeling a sensation of coldness or having been made cold by e.g. ice or refrigeration)
Sense 4
Meaning:
Devoid of warmth and cordiality; expressive of unfriendliness or disdain
Example:
wintry smile
Synonyms:
frigid; frosty; frozen; glacial; icy; wintry
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
cold (extended meanings; especially of psychological coldness; without human warmth or emotion)
Derivation:
iciness (a lack of affection or enthusiasm)
Context examples:
Their icy and glittering peaks shone in the sunlight over the clouds.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
New close-up images of a region near Pluto’s equator reveal a giant surprise: a range of youthful mountains rising as high as 11,000 feet (3,500 meters) above the surface of the icy body.
(The Icy Mountains of Pluto, NASA)
However, because the planet's host star is much dimmer than the sun, the planet is much colder than Earth — a little colder, in fact, than Jupiter's icy moon Europa.
(Newfound Frozen World Orbits in Binary Star System, NASA)
In the colder periods, nitrogen dominated the atmosphere, raining down and cycling through the icy crust to collect in pools just below the surface.
(New Models Suggest Titan Lakes Are Explosion Craters, NASA)
Scientists theorize that the decay of radioactive elements within Ceres produced heat that drove this alteration process, separating Ceres into a rocky interior and icy outer shell.
(Where is the Ice on Ceres?, NASA)
Located beyond Neptune's orbit, the belt comprises icy objects and rocks—among them four dwarf planets: Pluto, Eris, Makemake, and Haumea.
(Brazil astronomers discover ring around dwarf planet near Pluto, Agência Brasil)
They did not remove their foot-gear, though the water was icy cold—so cold that their ankles ached and their feet went numb.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
I felt my heart icy cold, but it did not even occur to me to draw back.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
This frozen region is north of Pluto’s icy mountains, in the center-left of the heart feature, informally named “Tombaugh Regio”.
(New Horizons Discovers Frozen Plains in the Heart of Pluto’s ‘Heart’, NASA)
At the time of the 1997 flyby, about 124 miles (200 kilometers) above Europa's surface, the Galileo team didn't suspect the spacecraft might be grazing a plume erupting from the icy moon.
(Old Data Reveal New Evidence of Europa Plumes, NASA)
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