biodegradingn.
/ˌbʌɪə(ʊ)dᵻˈɡreɪdɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌbaɪoʊdəˈɡreɪdɪŋ/, /ˌbaɪoʊdiˈɡreɪdɪŋ/ The action of biodegrade v.
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1970 Science 18 Dec. 1349 (advt.) Immediate concern is in detection, classification, and determination of characteristics of oil in typical marine environments including products of biodegrading processes.
1991 Guardian (Nexis) 30 Nov. [House] dust has had a bad press. It is, after all, organic: evidence of biodegrading.
2005 P. B. Corcoran & M. Pennock in T. Grant & G. Littlejohn Teaching Green 22/2 Watching things rot is uniquely and endlessly fascinating to small children, and many of the students started experiments in biodegrading at home.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, November 2010; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
biodegradingadj.
/ˌbʌɪə(ʊ)dᵻˈɡreɪdɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌbaɪoʊdəˈɡreɪdɪŋ/, /ˌbaɪoʊdiˈɡreɪdɪŋ/ That biodegrades, or is biodegraded. Cf. biodegrade v.
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1970 Hearings U.S. Congr. House. Comm. on Sci. & Astronautics ii. (Suppl. Hearings Technol. Assessem. & Environment) 880 The next shortest [approach] would be incineratable or biodegrading containers.
1980 Sci. Total Environment 15 45 It was light brown in colour and resembled a biodegrading mousse previously produced during a laboratory experiment.
2006 Vancouver Province (Brit. Columbia) (Nexis) 2 Oct. a11 Scientists..and a local environmental group are calling for the grasses to be cut, bagged and taken away before the biodegrading oil residue starts to make its way into the food chain.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, November 2010; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
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n.1970adj.1970