Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To heat (a substance) to a high temperature but below the melting or fusing point, causing loss of moisture, reduction or oxidation, and the decomposition of carbonates and other compounds.
  • intransitive verb To convert (liquid material, especially radioactive wastes) to granular solids by drying at very high temperatures.
  • intransitive verb To be calcined.
  • noun A substance produced by calcining.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Fragments of already burnt fire-clay vessels, as the saggars of porcelain manufacture, ground up and used in making new vessels, with addition of fresh fire-clay. Also chamotte.
  • To consume by burning; burn to ashes.
  • To purify or refine by fire.
  • To desiccate by subjection to heat so as to destroy contained organisms, etc.: as, to calcine air.
  • To convert into lime or calx by the action of heat; treat (limestone) by the process of calcination for the formation of lime.
  • To oxidize, as a metal, by heating.
  • In metallurgy, to subject to the action of heat, with access of air: nearly equivalent to roast (which see).
  • To be converted into a powder or friable substance, or into a calx, by the action of heat.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb To reduce to a powder, or to a friable state, by the action of heat; to expel volatile matter from by means of heat, as carbonic acid from limestone, and thus (usually) to produce disintegration; as to, calcine bones.
  • intransitive verb To oxidize, as a metal by the action of heat; to reduce to a metallic calx.
  • intransitive verb To be converted into a powder or friable substance, or into a calx, by the action of heat.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive to heat something without melting in order to drive off water etc., and to decompose carbonates into oxides or to oxidize or reduce it; especially to heat limestone to form quicklime
  • verb intransitive to undergo such heating

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb heat a substance so that it oxidizes or reduces

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English calcinen, from Old French calciner, from Medieval Latin calcīnāre, from Late Latin calcīna, quicklime, from Latin calx, calc-, lime; see calx.]

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Examples

  • Kunckel had described experiments to calcine gold with aqua regia to make a transparent red color. 7 The affiliation of the best examples of this product with German and Bohemian glassmakers was exploited by Mayer Oppenheim when he applied for patents in Britain to make ruby and garnet colored glass.

    The Creation of Color in Eighteenth-Century Europe 2006

  • My fires would flame on high and every land calcine.

    The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night 2006

  • I suppose the cause of that redish colour is occasioned as follows: the Minium assists in some manner to calcine the copper yet further than in was before & uniting together produces that effect so I think no minium shall be used with Copper in any form whatever.

    The Creation of Color in Eighteenth-Century Europe 2006

  • To obtain sulphuric acid, Cyrus Harding had only one operation to make, to calcine the sulphate of iron crystals in a closed vase, so that the sulphuric acid should distil in vapor, which vapor, by condensation, would produce the acid.

    The Mysterious Island 2005

  • To obtain sulphuric acid, Cyrus Harding had only one operation to make, to calcine the sulphate of iron crystals in a closed vase, so that the sulphuric acid should distil in vapor, which vapor, by condensation, would produce the acid.

    The Mysterious Island 2005

  • Alboufaki, stood aghast at the command of Carathis to set forward, notwithstanding it was noon, and the heat fierce enough to calcine even rocks.

    The History of the Caliph Vathek 2004

  • CALCINATIO calcine (vb) To heat to a high temperature but without fusing in order to drive off volatile matter or to effect changes.

    A Darker Place King, Laurie R. 1999

  • The solution is to replace magnesia by other materials, to calcine part of the clay or to use calcined zinc oxide instead of raw.

    11. Glaze problems 1993

  • Gypsum starts to calcine from around 100ºC, and since set plaster is actually gypsum, the plaster moulds also become calcined on heating.

    9. Drying of ware and moulds 1991

  • I am of opinion that in cases such as this, where it is not intended to adopt the chlorination or cyanogen process, it will be found most economical to crush to a coarse gauge, concentrate, calcine the concentrates, and finally amalgamate in some suitable amalgamator.

    Getting Gold: a practical treatise for prospectors, miners and students

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