INCUBATE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does incubate mean? 

• INCUBATE (verb)
  The verb INCUBATE has 2 senses:

1. grow under conditions that promote development

2. sit on (eggs)

  Familiarity information: INCUBATE used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• INCUBATE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they incubate    ... he / she / it incubates   
Past simple: incubated   
Past participle: incubated   
-ing form: incubating   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Grow under conditions that promote development

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "incubate" is one way to...):

develop (grow, progress, unfold, or evolve through a process of evolution, natural growth, differentiation, or a conducive environment)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Derivation:

incubation (maintaining something at the most favorable temperature for its development)

incubation ((pathology) the phase in the development of an infection between the time a pathogen enters the body and the time the first symptoms appear)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Sit on (eggs)

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Synonyms:

brood; cover; hatch; incubate

Context example:

The female covers the eggs

Hypernyms (to "incubate" is one way to...):

multiply; procreate; reproduce (have offspring or produce more individuals of a given animal or plant)

"Incubate" entails doing...:

sit; sit down (take a seat)

Verb group:

hatch (emerge from the eggs)

breed; cover (copulate with a female, used especially of horses)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

incubation (sitting on eggs so as to hatch them by the warmth of the body)

incubator (apparatus consisting of a box designed to maintain a constant temperature by the use of a thermostat; used for chicks or premature infants)

 Context examples 

The tubes are incubated for a specified period of time and each is assessed for bacterial cell growth.

(Macro Broth Dilution Method, NCI Thesaurus)

A measurement of the amount of interferon gamma that is released when Mycobacterium tuberculosis antigen is incubated with a biological specimen, usually blood.

(Mycobacterium tuberculosis Interferon Gamma Response, NCI Thesaurus)

Serum is incubated with a membrane strip on which four recombinant viral proteins are attached.

(Hepatitis C Virus Recombinant Immonoblot Assay, NCI Thesaurus)

Bird eggs incubate for 11 to 85 days, about half the time of most other egg-laying vertebrates.

(Slow-cooking dinosaur eggs may have contributed to extinction, Wikinews)

They then incubated knee sensory nerves isolated from mice in either healthy or osteoarthritis synovial fluid and recorded the activity of these nerves.

(Joint lubricating fluid plays key role in osteoarthritic pain, University of Cambridge)

The plate is incubated for a specified period of time and each well is assessed for bacterial cell growth.

(Micro Broth Dilution Method, NCI Thesaurus)

Back in the lab, the researchers incubated the pathogens Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus epidermidis, which breeds skin infections, with clays from different zones of the Oregon deposit.

(New answer to MRSA, other 'superbug' infections: clay minerals?, NSF)

It was a habit he developed, of incubating and maturing his thought upon a subject, and of then rushing into the type-writer with it.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Serum is incubated with vital protein that have been gel separated and affixed to a membrane.

(HIV Western Blot, NCI Thesaurus)

For the procedure, a sterile gauze pad was incubated in the mother’s birth canal an hour before the C-section.

(Restoring microbes in infants born by cesarean section, NIH)