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Glite Dictionary
🧬 To freeze without ice 🧪 To turn to glass
to vitrify

to vitrify

1 9.3
To preserve cells or embryos by cooling them fast so liquids become like glass without ice crystals
  • verb
  • /ˈvɪtrɪfaɪ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : vitrificar
  • When preparing the biological material, the team ensured it would vitrify to maintain its integrity during storage.

Examples

  • To preserve the cells for future study, scientists decided to vitrify them using a special cryogenic technique.

  • The researcher found that vitrifying the samples prevented ice crystal formation during the cooling process.

  • Any liquid will vitrify, or solidify into a glass, if it's cooled rapidly enough. (See figure 1b.)

    Academic text (2012)

Synonyms

to cryopreserve
vsto vitrify
  • Specialized
1 8.9

To cool and store cells, tissue, or living things at very cold temperatures so they do not decay

is more specific using very rapid cooling to make liquids glassy without ice crystals

Surface Forms

vitrify infinitive
vitrified past
vitrified past participle
vitrifying present participle
vitrifies third person singular

Morphology

vitrify = vitreous (semi-transparent) = vitr + ify

The technical cryobiology sense is an extension of 'make glass-like' (amorphous solidification), but it relies on the combining form 'vitr-' rather than a familiar standalone base, making it partly accessible but somewhat specialized.

Etymology

Vitrify comes from the Latin root vitrum meaning 'glass'. In medical freezing, to vitrify something is to cool it so fast the liquid becomes a 'glass-like' solid without making ice crystals, so the origin shows it always means to make something 'glass-like'.