freezing

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈfɹiːz.ɪŋ/

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• Rhymes: -iːzɪŋ

freezing (comparative more freezing, superlative most freezing)

1. (literally) Suffering or causing frost
2. (by extension, chiefly hyperbolic) Very cold
3. (with above or below) Zero °C, the freezing point of water.
   • 1998, Bruce Jakosky, The Search for Life on Other Planets‎:

     Despite this, the average temperature at the surface [of Mars] is 50–60K below freezing, making it hard to imagine that any plants or animals could survive.

• (literally): frosty, frigorific
• (very cold): ice-cold, icy

• subfreezing

freezing (countable and uncountable, plural freezings)

1. (uncountable) The change in state of a substance from liquid to solid by cooling to a critically low temperature.
   • 1829, James Macauley, The natural, statistical, and civil history of the state of New York:

     Hence, there is a succession of thawings and freezings. The former expand, and endeavour to restore the surface of the ground to its natural condition, while the latter contract and harden it.

   • 2015, Kevin Revolinski, 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: Madison (page 116)

     […] and the sloping collection of fractured rocks—known as talus—that tumbled down from the quartzite bluffs during the repeated freezings and unfreezings of the last Ice Age.

2. (countable, medicine) The action of numbing with anesthetics.

• frost

• freeze-dry
• freezer

freezing

1. present participle and gerund of freeze

• freezing point