stardust
English
WOTD – 16 June 2022
Etymology
The night sky above Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory at Cerro Tololo, Chile. The bright region in the centre of the photograph is the Milky Way Galaxy, while the band of white light appearing to emerge from the horizon and stretch to the Milky Way is zodiacal light, caused by sunlight reflecting off stardust (sense 1.1) in the Solar System’s interplanetary dust cloud.
From star + dust.[1]
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈstɑːdʌst/
Audio (Southern England) (file) - (General American) IPA(key): /ˈstɑɹˌdʌst/
- Hyphenation: star‧dust
Noun
stardust (usually uncountable, plural stardusts)
- (astronomy)
- Small fragments of dust-like material found in space; specifically, a type of cosmic dust that formed from cooling gases ejected from presolar stars, which was then incorporated into the cloud from which the Solar System condensed.
- Synonyms: extraterrestrial dust, space dust
- We are all made of stardust.
- 2004 March 5, Ann N. Nguyen; Ernst Zinner, “Discovery of Ancient Silicate Stardust in a Meteorite”, in Science, volume 303, number 5663, Washington, D.C.: American Association for the Advancement of Science, DOI:, ISSN 0036-8075, OCLC 1039268034, PMID 15001773, page 1496:
- Presolar grains were isolated in primitive meteorites only 15 years ago. These grains of stardust formed in the atmospheres of evolved stars and in nova and supernova ejecta.
- (informal, dated) A distant cluster of stars resembling a cloud of dust, especially if the individual stars of which cannot be resolved with a telescope.
- (archaic) Small fragments in the Earth's atmosphere or on its surface originating from meteorites; meteor dust.
- Small fragments of dust-like material found in space; specifically, a type of cosmic dust that formed from cooling gases ejected from presolar stars, which was then incorporated into the cloud from which the Solar System condensed.
- (figuratively)
- Something imaginary or lacking substance.
- 1934, Virginia Woolf, Walter Sickert: A Conversation, London: Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, […], OCLC 1323300100, page 90:
- His [Sickert's] paint has a tangible quality; it is made not of air and star-dust but of oil and earth.
-
- An imaginary magic dust or powder that, when in one's eyes, supposedly causes one to view a person or thing favourably, even though this might not actually be warranted.
- My sister’s eyes were full of stardust – she’d spend hours lazily planning her future life when she would make her big break in the movies.
- An imaginary magic dust or powder supposedly able to give one charisma or other positive qualities; hence, charisma or glamour, especially that possessed by a celebrity.
- 2015 May 5, Steven Davidoff Solomon, “Sprinkling a Little Celebrity Stardust on Silicon Valley”, in The New York Times, ISSN 0362-4331:
- Why would experienced deal makers want rock stars and actors to advise them? Why would entrepreneurs seek their money? There is a certain cachet with all that stardust, of course, and perhaps some free publicity.
-
- Something imaginary or lacking substance.
Translations
small fragments of dust-like material found in space
|
distant cluster of stars resembling a cloud of dust
|
small fragments in the Earth's atmosphere or on its surface originating from meteorites
|
something imaginary or lacking substance
|
imaginary magic dust or powder that, when in one’s eyes, supposedly causes one to view a person or thing favourably, even though this might not actually be warranted
|
imaginary magic dust or powder supposedly able to give one charisma or other positive qualities
|
charisma or glamour, especially that possessed by a celebrity — see charisma, glamour
References
- “stardust, n.”, in OED Online
, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, March 2022; “stardust, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
Further reading
cosmic dust on Wikipedia.Wikipedia - stardust (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia