BIOSPHERE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does biosphere mean? 

• BIOSPHERE (noun)
  The noun BIOSPHERE has 1 sense:

1. the regions of the surface and atmosphere of the Earth (or other planet) where living organisms exist

  Familiarity information: BIOSPHERE used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• BIOSPHERE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The regions of the surface and atmosphere of the Earth (or other planet) where living organisms exist

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Hypernyms ("biosphere" is a kind of...):

part; region (the extended spatial location of something)

Holonyms ("biosphere" is a part of...):

major planet; planet ((astronomy) any of the nine large celestial bodies in the solar system that revolve around the sun and shine by reflected light; Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto in order of their proximity to the sun; viewed from the constellation Hercules, all the planets rotate around the sun in a counterclockwise direction)

 Context examples 

The deep biosphere: an underground ecosystem of bacteria and multi-celled organisms vastly outweighing all of human life on the surface.

(Researchers Create New Model of Ecosystem Hidden Beneath Earth, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

They modelled a variety of possible exoplanets, and were able to define which exoplanet types stand the best chance of developing and sustaining thriving biospheres.

(Some Exoplanets May Have Greater Variety of Life than Exists on Earth, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

According to Brent C. Christner, the paper's lead author and a researcher with the NSF-funded Whillans Ice Stream Subglacial Access Research Drilling (WISSARD) project, Hidden beneath a half-mile of ice in Antarctica is an unexplored part of our biosphere.

(800 meters beneath Antarctic ice sheet, subglacial lake holds viable microbial ecosystems, NSF)

By compiling data on microbial diversity and concentration, researchers estimated the deep biosphere has twice the volume of all of Earth's oceans and its mass is hundreds of times greater than that of all humans on the surface.

(Researchers Create New Model of Ecosystem Hidden Beneath Earth, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)