polar
[poh-ler]
- of or relating to the North or South Pole.
- of or relating to the pole of any sphere, a magnet, an electric cell, etc.
- opposite in character or action: The two have personalities that are polar.
- capable of ionizing, as NaCl, HCl, or NaOH; electrolytic; heteropolar.
- central; pivotal: the polar provision of the treaty.
- analogous to the polestar as a guide; guiding: a polar precept.
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Origin of polar
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Related Words
icyfreezingfrigidglacialarcticextremefarthestfrozennorthterminalsouthantagonisticantipodalantitheticalcontradictorycontraryconversecounterdiametricreverseExamples from the Web for polar
Contemporary Examples
The weather, the conditions, you can imagine it—a polar bear in a desert, with a swimming pool 50 centimetres deep.
Shaked spoke in these generalities initially—referring to two sets of people, two polar opposites on a pendulum.
Knesset Member Walks Back On Facebook Post Calling Palestinian Kids ‘Little Snakes’Gideon Resnick
July 11, 2014
Sykes suspects that the hairs come from either an unrecognized bear species, or an unknown hybrid of polar bear and brown bear.
She would leave every day of shooting during the polar vortex just grinning from ear-to-ear.
Lori Petty on ‘Orange Is the New Black,’ the Halcyon ‘90s, and Discovering Jennifer LawrenceMarlow Stern
June 8, 2014
The world of the military is to the writer admittedly “the polar opposite” of his own.
Historical Examples
Polar ice would have been thawed by this reopening of communication.
MalboneThomas Wentworth Higginson
But here, within the Polar circle, what is the lowest degree?
The Field of IceJules Verne
It is no new sea, returned Altamont; it is in every Polar chart, and has a name already.
The Field of IceJules Verne
It was a domed city in the polar regions, where nobody ever had to go outdoors.
Pariah PlanetMurray Leinster
I wonder if he's been frozen to death or eat up by polar bears, or what.
Thankful's InheritanceJoseph C. Lincoln
polar
- situated at or near, coming from, or relating to either of the earth's poles or the area inside the Arctic or Antarctic Circlespolar regions
- having or relating to a pole or poles
- pivotal or guiding in the manner of the Pole Star
- directly opposite, as in tendency or character
- chem
- Also: heteropolar(of a molecule or compound) being or having a molecule in which there is an uneven distribution of electrons and thus a permanent dipole momentwater has polar molecules
- (of a crystal or substance) being or having a crystal that is bound by ionic bondssodium chloride forms polar crystals
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for polar
adj.
1550s, from Middle French polaire (16c.) or directly from Medieval Latin polaris "of or pertaining to the poles," from Latin polus "an end of an axis" (see pole (n.2)). Meaning "directly opposite in character or tendency" is attested from 1832. Polar bear first recorded 1781.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
polar
(pō′lər)- Of or relating to a pole.
- Having poles. Used of certain nerve cells having one or more processes.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
polar
[pō′lər]
- Relating to a pole, such as the pole of a magnet or one of the electrodes of an electrolytic cell.
- Relating to the North Pole or the South Pole of Earth, or analogous regions of another planet.
- Relating to a molecule or substance that has polar bonds.
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The American Heritage® Science Dictionary
Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.