NOXIOUS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does noxious mean? 

• NOXIOUS (adjective)
  The adjective NOXIOUS has 1 sense:

1. injurious to physical or mental health

  Familiarity information: NOXIOUS used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• NOXIOUS (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Injurious to physical or mental health

Context example:

noxious ideas

Similar:

baneful; deadly; pernicious; pestilent (exceedingly harmful)

corrupting; degrading (harmful to the mind or morals)

vesicant; vesicatory (causing blisters)

Also:

harmful (causing or capable of causing harm)

toxic (of or relating to or caused by a toxin or poison)

unwholesome (detrimental to physical or moral well-being)

Antonym:

innocuous (not injurious to physical or mental health)

Derivation:

noxiousness (the quality of being noxious)

 Context examples 

In many parts of the United States it is considered a noxious weed.

(Hypericum perforatum, NCI Thesaurus)

Fanconi Syndrome caused by exposure to noxious agents.

(Acquired Fanconi Syndrome, NCI Thesaurus)

The minimum level of stimulation of a body part that a person will perceive as being noxious or unpleasant.

(Pain threshold, NCI Thesaurus)

For the rat, mark you, being a foul-living creature, hath a natural drawing or affinity for all foul things, so that the noxious humors pass from the man into the unclean beast.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

What’s interesting is that this noxious ice is made of two molecules that condensed together out of a rich mixture of gases at the south pole.

(NASA Team Finds Noxious Ice Cloud on Saturn’s Moon Titan, NASA)

Noxious stimuli, such as shock in laboratory animal experiments, are considered to be negative reinforcers.

(Negative Reinforcer, NCI Thesaurus)

Removal, separation, detachment, extirpation, or eradication of a body part, pathway, or function by surgery, chemical destruction, morbid process, or noxious substance.

(Ablation Therapy, NCI Thesaurus)

But ozone, a noxious chemical byproduct of fossil fuel combustion, has received relatively little attention as a potential threat to corn agriculture.

(Study finds rising ozone a hidden threat to corn, National Science Foundation)

Now, uttered before a stranger, the accusation cut me to the heart; I dimly perceived that she was already obliterating hope from the new phase of existence which she destined me to enter; I felt, though I could not have expressed the feeling, that she was sowing aversion and unkindness along my future path; I saw myself transformed under Mr. Brocklehurst's eye into an artful, noxious child, and what could I do to remedy the injury?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Any noxious and unintended response(s) to a medical product or procedure, for which a causal relationship with this product or procedure is at least a reasonable possibility i.e., the relationship cannot be ruled out.

(Adverse Reaction, NCI Thesaurus)