carbonaceousadj.

1727 P. Shaw & E. Chambers tr. H. Boerhaave New Method Chem. 263 The oils contained in all vegetable animal substances, and which appear in manner of a carbonaceous blackness [L. olea in omnibus vegetabilibus & animalibus haerentia specie nigredinis vel nigri corporis].

1764 Med. Museum III. 265 The mixture of a carbonaceous substance and a little fixed alkali, which will cause the flowers [of antimony] to melt.

1787 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 77 453 A composition of a black sooty or carbonaceous powder and oil, probably something like our present Printer's ink.

1863 Possibil. Creation 53 Manchester would soon be enveloped in a great carbonaceous fog.

1906 H. J. H. Fenton Notes Qualitative Anal. (new ed.) 33 Solid tartrates heated with concentrated H₂SO₄ blacken immediately, owing to separation of carbonaceous matter, and evolve CO and CO₂.

1949 Our Industry (Anglo-Iranian Oil Co.) (ed. 2) ix. 236 A modern internal combustion engine oil..must be of a certain hydrocarbon type, improved by the inclusion of additives which keep carbonaceous particles in dispersion.

1987 APT Bull. 19 18/3 The gray-black slate produced there [sc. Pennsylvania] can be distinguished by its carbonaceous appearance and the graphite that rubs off on one's hand.

2002 Oxoniensia 66 137 Residues consisting of black carbonaceous material, almost always on the interior surface, were recorded on a number of sherds.

1788 W. Nicholson tr. A.-F. de Fourcroy Elements Nat. Hist. & Chem. II. iv. 3 Mr. Lavoisier now calls it [sc. cretaceous (= carbonic) acid] carbonaceous acid [Fr. acide charbonneux].

1807 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 97 268 To consume certain known quantities of diamond and other carbonaceous substances in oxygene gas.

1879 Christian World 19 Dec. 814/1 Food..is made up of two constituents, the nitrogenous or flesh-forming part, and the carbonaceous or heat-producing part.

1964 L. H. Van Vlack Elements Materials Sci. (ed. 2) xiii. 389/1 If a low-carbon steel is exposed to a carbonaceous atmosphere at high temperatures, the small carbon atoms can be diffused into the subsurface of the solid metal to produce a high-carbon case.

1967 Sputnik Monthly Digest Nov. 127/2 We speak all the time of ‘earthly life’ of the carbonaceous, protein type.

2006 M. Pollan Omnivore's Dilemma xi. 216 The scratching of the hens turns the nitrogenous rabbit pee into the carbonaceous bedding, creating a rich compost.

1815 Ann. Philos. 5 146 On this account, Freisleben is inclined to rank this field, not with the true coal formation, but with the carbonaceous beds subordinate to the rothetodte.

1833 C. Lyell Princ. Geol. III. 222 In one part of the series, carbonaceous shales occur.

1878 A. H. Green et al. Coal: Hist. & Uses i. 27 The beds..more or less coaly or carbonaceous in character.

1929 G. P. Merrill Minerals from Earth & Sky ii. iv. 196 At the Kimberley mines the diamantiferous area is inclosed in a wall of nearly horizontal black carbonaceous shale.

1931 Bull. Amer. Assoc. Petroleum Geologists 15 161 Source rocks of petroleum include carbonaceous or ‘bituminous’ sedimentary deposits, containing aquatic plant and animal remains.

1997 G. S. Helfman et al. Diversity of Fishes xvii. 313/2 Caves usually develop in limestone formations (karst) because of the solubility of carbonaceous rock.

1904 H. A. Ward Catal. Ward-Coonley Coll. Meteorites 99 The classification which we have adopted in this catalogue is that of Dr. Aristides Brezina, of Vienna... Carbonaceous Chondrite (K). Dull black, friable Chondri with free carbon and of low specific gravity, metallic iron nearly or wholly wanting.

1964 Science 19 June 1475/2 The assumption [is] that carbonaceous chondrites represent the groups of meteorites altered least from the original aggregations of cosmic dust particles forming all meteorites.

2003 B. Bryson Short Hist. Nearly Everything (2004) xix. 356 The meteorite was of a rare type known as a carbonaceous chondrite, and the townspeople helpfully collected and brought in some 90 kilograms of it.