Incandescent

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Incandescent \In`can*des"cent\, a. [L. incandecens, -entis, p.
     pr. of incandescere to become warm or hot; pref. in- in +
     candescere to become of a glittering whiteness, to become red
     hot, incho. fr. candere to be of a glittering whiteness: cf.
     F. incandescent. See {Candle}.]
     White, glowing, or luminous, with intense heat; as,


     incandescent carbon or platinum; hence, clear; shining;
     brilliant.
     [1913 Webster]
  
           Holy Scripture become resplendent; or, as one might
           say, incandescent throughout.            --I. Taylor.
     [1913 Webster]
  
     {Incandescent lamp}, {Incandescent light}, {Incandescent
     light bulb} (Elec.), a kind of lamp in which the light is
        produced by a thin filament of conducting material, now
        usually tungsten, but originally carbon, contained in a
        vacuum or an atmosphere of inert gas within a glass bulb,
        and heated to incandescence by an electric current. It was
        inventerd by Thomas Edison, and was once called the
        {Edison lamp}; -- called also {incandescence lamp}, and
        {glowlamp}. This is one of the two most common sources of
        electric light, the other being the {fluorescent light},
        {fluorescent lamp} or {fluorescent bulb}.
        [1913 Webster +PJC]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  incandescent
       adj 1: emitting light as a result of being heated; "an incandescent
              bulb" [syn: {candent}]
       2: characterized by ardent emotion or intensity or brilliance;
          "an incandescent performance"

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  82 Moby Thesaurus words for "incandescent":
     ablaze, afire, aflame, aflicker, aglow, alight, ardent, beaming,
     beamy, blazing, blushing, bright, bright and sunny, brilliant,
     burning, candent, candescent, comburent, conflagrant, effulgent,
     fiery, flagrant, flaming, flaring, flickering, flushing, fulgent,
     fuming, gleaming, gleamy, glinting, glowing, guttering, ignescent,
     ignited, illuminant, in a blaze, in a glow, in flames, inflamed,
     irradiative, kindled, lambent, lamping, light as day, live, living,
     lucent, luciferous, lucific, luciform, luminant, luminative,
     luminiferous, luminificent, luminous, lustrous, on fire, orient,
     radiant, red-hot, reeking, refulgent, rutilant, rutilous,
     scintillant, scintillating, shining, shiny, smoking, smoldering,
     sparking, starbright, starlike, starry, streaming, suffused, sunny,
     sunshiny, unextinguished, unquenched, white-hot