abiotic
Americanadjective
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Not associated with or derived from living organisms. Abiotic factors in an environment include such items as sunlight, temperature, wind patterns, and precipitation.
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Etymology
Origin of abiotic
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Explanation
In science, anything abiotic is not alive. Abiotic factors in an ecosystem are things like temperature, ocean currents, and humidity. Abiotic elements play an important role in the world, in a variety of ways. Everything that isn't living, and never was living, is considered abiotic—from the sand on the beach and boulders on a mountain to the sunlight from above and the mineral makeup of the soil beneath your feet. Abiotic comes from the prefix a-, "without," and biotic, "pertaining to life."
Vocabulary lists containing abiotic
Organisms and Environments 1: The Environment
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The ACT Science Test: Earth Science Review
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The results show that biotic interactions can have a strong influence on plants' ability to adapt to abiotic factors and that adaptation is most efficient when plants are exposed to a variety of interactions.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 19, 2024
Specifically, they cite several questions that existing laws leave unaddressed -- including issues of atmospheric and abiotic contamination -- which constitute important gaps in planetary policy that must be confronted, collaboratively.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 3, 2024
“This is the first sign of an abiotic source,” says Nora Hänni, a chemist at the University of Bern who presented the discovery last week at the General Assembly of the European Geosciences Union.
From Science Magazine ● Apr. 26, 2024
"That leads us also to the question of rules of life: Can we use this method to start understanding what it is that makes life as a chemical system quite distinct from abiotic systems?"
From Salon ● Sep. 26, 2023
Thus, mineral nutrients are cycled, either rapidly or slowly, through the entire biosphere between the biotic and abiotic world and from one living organism to another.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 25, 2013
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
