PHOSPHINE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does phosphine mean? 

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

1. a colorless gas with a strong fishy smell; used as a pesticide

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

 Dictionary entry details 

• PHOSPHINE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A colorless gas with a strong fishy smell; used as a pesticide

Classified under:

Nouns denoting substances

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

gas (a fluid in the gaseous state having neither independent shape nor volume and being able to expand indefinitely)

pesticide (a chemical used to kill pests (as rodents or insects))

 Context examples 

The main conclusion is that, if phosphine is detected in a nearby, rocky planet, that planet must be harboring life of some kind.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Most life on Earth, specifically all aerobic, oxygen-breathing life, wants nothing to do with phosphine, neither producing it nor relying on it for survival.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

And we went through several years of this process to figure out that nothing else but life makes detectable amounts of phosphine.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

They fed into the simulation different rates of phosphine production and extrapolated what a given atmosphere's spectrum of light would look like given a certain rate of phosphine production.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The researchers worked out the chemical pathways and thermodynamics involved in multiple scenarios on Earth to see if they could produce enough energy to turn phosphorous into phosphine.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

At some point we were looking at increasingly less-plausible mechanisms, like if tectonic plates were rubbing against each other, could you get a plasma spark that generated phosphine?

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Or if lightning hit somewhere that had phosphorous, or a meteor had a phosphorous content, could it generate an impact to make phosphine?

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Phosphine is a molecule made from one phosphorous and three hydrogen atoms, which normally do not prefer to come together.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Phosphine, they found, has no significant false positives, meaning any detection of phosphine is a sure sign of life.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

In the 1970s, phosphine was discovered in the atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn—immensely hot gas giants.

(Poisonous Earthly Molecule May Be Sign of Extraterrestrial Life, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)