IMMERSE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does immerse mean? 

• IMMERSE (verb)
  The verb IMMERSE has 4 senses:

1. thrust or throw into

2. devote (oneself) fully to

3. enclose or envelop completely, as if by swallowing

4. cause to be immersed

  Familiarity information: IMMERSE used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• IMMERSE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they immerse    ... he / she / it immerses   
Past simple: immersed   
Past participle: immersed   
-ing form: immersing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Thrust or throw into

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

immerse; plunge

Context example:

Immerse yourself in hot water

Hypernyms (to "immerse" is one way to...):

penetrate; perforate (pass into or through, often by overcoming resistance)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "immerse"):

dip; dunk (dip into a liquid while eating)

dip; douse; dunk; plunge; souse (immerse briefly into a liquid so as to wet, coat, or saturate)

dip (plunge (one's hand or a receptacle) into a container)

dip (immerse in a disinfectant solution)

submerge; submerse (put under water)

soak (submerge in a liquid)

sheathe (plunge or bury (a knife or sword) in flesh)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody PP
Somebody ----s something PP
Somebody ----s PP

Sentence example:

They immerse the object in the water

Sense 2

Meaning:

Devote (oneself) fully to

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Synonyms:

absorb; engross; engulf; immerse; plunge; soak up; steep

Context example:

He immersed himself into his studies

Hypernyms (to "immerse" is one way to...):

center; centre; concentrate; focus; pore; rivet (direct one's attention on something)

Verb group:

immerse; plunge (cause to be immersed)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "immerse"):

drink; drink in (be fascinated or spell-bound by; pay close attention to)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s somebody PP

Derivation:

immersion (complete attention; intense mental effort)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Enclose or envelop completely, as if by swallowing

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

bury; eat up; immerse; swallow; swallow up

Context example:

The huge waves swallowed the small boat and it sank shortly thereafter

Hypernyms (to "immerse" is one way to...):

close in; enclose; inclose; shut in (surround completely)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s somebody
Something ----s something

Sense 4

Meaning:

Cause to be immersed

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Synonyms:

immerse; plunge

Context example:

The professor plunged his students into the study of the Italian text

Cause:

absorb; engross; engulf; immerse; plunge; soak up; steep (devote (oneself) fully to)

Verb group:

absorb; engross; engulf; immerse; plunge; soak up; steep (devote (oneself) fully to)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

immersion (the act of wetting something by submerging it)

 Context examples 

A fibrogranular network of residual structural elements within which are immersed both chromatin and ribonucleoproteins.

(Nuclear Matrix, NCI Thesaurus)

He is completely immersed in large public questions, and is rather inaccessible to all ordinary emotions.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The act of immersing the body in water or sunshine.

(Bathing, NCI Thesaurus)

When the device is immersed in water, one light absorber uses the catalyst to produce oxygen.

(‘Artificial leaf’ successfully produces clean gas, University of Cambridge)

Thus situated, employed in the most detestable occupation, immersed in a solitude where nothing could for an instant call my attention from the actual scene in which I was engaged, my spirits became unequal; I grew restless and nervous.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

The strip, designed for early diagnosis of infection caused by the Plasmodium falciparum parasites responsible for the most aggressive and lethal form of the disease, gives a result within 30 minutes of being immersed in a solution with samples of blood, serum or saliva of an infected person.

(Biosensor promises early malaria diagnosis, SciDev.Net)

Gopalan tells that the compound, made by using epoxy as a base and incorporating mango leaf extracts in a substrate of amorphous silica, achieved 99 per cent inhibition of corrosion in commercial steel when immersed in a saline medium to mimic seawater.

(Mango leaf extract can stop ships from rusting, SciDev.Net)

I had opened the morning paper and was immersed in a sensational crime which had occurred in London the night before, when my friend gave an exclamation, sprang to his feet, and laid his pipe down upon the mantelpiece.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Her visit was, I remember, extremely unwelcome to Holmes, for he was immersed at the moment in a very abstruse and complicated problem concerning the peculiar persecution to which John Vincent Harden, the well-known tobacco millionaire, had been subjected.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)