1 antarctic | Definition of antarctic

antarctic

adjective, often capitalized
ant·​arc·​tic | \ (ËŒ)ant-ˈärk-tik How to pronounce antarctic (audio) , -ˈär-tik How to pronounce antarctic (audio) \

Definition of antarctic

: of or relating to the south pole or to the region near it

Examples of antarctic in a Sentence

The group is involved in Antarctic exploration.

Recent Examples on the Web

These were much different worlds, with antarctic forests and warmth-loving reptiles at the poles—balmy interludes driven by naturally higher carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Peter Brannen, The Atlantic, "The Strange Future Hurricane Harvey Portends," 31 Aug. 2017 Antarctic ice cores have recorded an impressive span of climatic history for us, covering the last 800,000 years. Scott K. Johnson, Ars Technica, "Oldest Antarctic ice ever found shows climate of 2.7 million years ago," 17 Aug. 2017 El Niño is a weather event that brings unusually warm water in the Pacific Ocean, and one of the big takeaways from the research is that this strong El Niño in 2016 directly contributed to the unusually widespread Antarctic ice melt. Aj Willingham, CNN, "A huge part of Antarctica is melting and scientists say that's bad news," 19 June 2017 In 1964, his discovery of DDT residue in Antarctic penguins and seals testified to the pesticide’s vast reach. Sam Roberts, New York Times, "William J.L. Sladen, Expert on Penguin Libidos, Is Dead at 96," 17 June 2017 The scientists behind the Larsen C prediction are part of an Antarctic research group called Project MIDAS that investigates how global climate change impacts the ice shelf. Jonathan Vanian, Fortune, "A Giant Iceberg Is About to Break Off from Antarctica," 28 June 2017 Antarctic ozone wouldn’t recover to pre-1980 levels until well after the year 2100, the analyses suggest. Sid Perkins, Science | AAAS, "New threat to ozone layer found," 27 June 2017 This area includes the point at which the Indian subcontinent and the Australian and Antarctic continents separated during the breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana. Terri Cook, Scientific American, "Uncharted Territory," 26 June 2017 Ultimately, expanding Antarctic sea ice could help keep carbon dioxide in the ocean and out of the atmosphere. Conor Purcell, Ars Technica, "Thin ice: Vanishing ice only exacerbates a bad, climate change-fueled situation," 19 June 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'antarctic.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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First Known Use of antarctic

1594, in the meaning defined above

History and Etymology for antarctic

Middle English antartik, from Latin antarcticus, from Greek antarktikos, from anti- + arktikos arctic

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More Definitions for antarctic

antarctic

adjective

English Language Learners Definition of antarctic

: of or relating to the South Pole or the region around it

antarctic

adjective, often capitalized
ant·​arc·​tic | \ ant-ˈärk-tik How to pronounce antarctic (audio) , -ˈär-tik\

Kids Definition of antarctic

: of or relating to the south pole or to the region around it antarctic explorers

More from Merriam-Webster on antarctic

Rhyming Dictionary: Words that rhyme with antarctic

Spanish Central: Translation of antarctic

Nglish: Translation of antarctic for Spanish Speakers