The Collaborative International Dictionary
Organic \Or*gan"ic\, a. [L. organicus, Gr. ?: cf. F. organique.]
(Biol.) Of or pertaining to an organ or its functions, or to objects composed of organs; consisting of organs, or containing them; as, the organic structure of animals and plants; exhibiting characters peculiar to living organisms; as, organic bodies, organic life, organic remains. Cf. Inorganic.
Produced by the organs; as, organic pleasure. [R.]
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Instrumental; acting as instruments of nature or of art to a certain destined function or end. [R.]
Those organic arts which enable men to discourse and write perspicuously.
--Milton. Forming a whole composed of organs. Hence: Of or pertaining to a system of organs; inherent in, or resulting from, a certain organization; as, an organic government; his love of truth was not inculcated, but organic.
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(Chem.) Of or pertaining to compounds which are derivatives of hydrocarbons; pertaining to, or denoting, any one of a large series of carbon-containing compounds which are related to the carbon compounds produced by biological processes (such as methane, oils, fats, sugars, alcohols, ethers, proteins, etc.) and include many substances of artificial production which may or may not occur in animals or plants; -- contrasted with inorganic.
Note: Borderline cases exist which may be classified as either organic or inorganic, such as carbon terachloride (which may be viewed as a derivative of methane), but in general a compound must have a carbon with a hydrogen atom or another carbon atom attached to it to be viewed as truly organic, i.e. included in the subject matter of organic chemistry.
Note: The principles of organic and inorganic chemistry are identical; but the enormous number and the completeness of related series of organic compounds, together with their remarkable facility of exchange and substitution, offer an illustration of chemical reaction and homology not to be paralleled in inorganic chemistry.
Organic analysis (Chem.), the analysis of organic compounds, concerned chiefly with the determination of carbon as carbon dioxide, hydrogen as water, oxygen as the difference between the sum of the others and 100 per cent, and nitrogen as free nitrogen, ammonia, or nitric oxide; -- formerly called ultimate analysis, in distinction from proximate analysis.
Organic chemistry. See under Chemistry.
Organic compounds. (Chem.) Chemical substances which are organic[5]. See Carbon compounds, under Carbon.
Organic description of a curve (Geom.), the description of a curve on a plane by means of instruments.
--Brande & C.Organic disease (Med.), a disease attended with morbid changes in the structure of the organs of the body or in the composition of its fluids; -- opposed to functional disease.
Organic electricity. See under Electricity.
Organic law or Organic laws, a law or system of laws, or declaration of principles fundamental to the existence and organization of a political or other association; a constitution.
Organic stricture (Med.), a contraction of one of the natural passages of the body produced by structural changes in its walls, as distinguished from a spasmodic stricture, which is due to muscular contraction.
Wiktionary
n. (organic compound English)
Wikipedia
Some organic compounds are valid minerals, recognized by the CNMNC ( IMA).
Usage examples of "organic compounds".
Thus, the earliest self-replicating molecules depended on the supply of abiotically produced organic compounds washed down off the land into a few favored environments, and we can imagine some primordial, microscopic Malthus concluding gloomily that life would forever be restricted to thin strips of coastal shallows and tidal pools.
The thin atmospheres and icy surfaces of all these worlds are being irradiated-by cosmic rays, if nothing else and nitrogen-rich organic compounds are being formed.
After a few days, the water in the flasks had turned green and yellow in a hearty broth of amino acids, fatty acids, sugars, and other organic compounds.
Oddly enough, there are synthetic organic compounds, also not related to the sugars in any way, which are not only sweet but intensely sweet, and can be detected by the tongue in much smaller concentrations than ordinary sugar can.
So even organic compounds are as much parts of a planetary life-system as—.
So even organic compounds are as much parts of a planetary life-system as -- say -- rabbits on a Terran-type world.
We cannot regenerate organic compounds such as those which comprise the covering you called skin.
Ice, volatiles, and organic compounds: just the kind of rock we might have chosen to mine for ourselves, for life support, propellant.
If anything, it seemed to direct itself through the densest parts of the interstellar medium, and was heading in the general direction of a dustcloud rich in organic compounds.
Carbon dioxide and water would be converted into organic compounds, largely carbohydrates, and oxygen.
And on the surface, over a water-ice crust, lies that slush of complex organic compounds.
They harvested strange aquatic weeds for their complex organic compounds, which were used down in Memu Bay's biomedical factories.
Astronomers examining microwaves emitted and absorbed by molecules at distinctive frequencies have identified more than four dozen simple organic compounds in interstellar space--hydrocarbons, amines, alcohols and nitriles, some of them having long, straight carbon chains, such as HC11N.
What actually happens when a pistillate plant remains unfertilized for its entire life and how this ulti- mately affects the cannabinoid (class of molecules found only in Cannabis) and terpene (a class of aromatic organic compounds) levels remains a mystery.
The manufacture of NFMp is inhibited by any titanium-bearing organic compounds, but only at effective levels by large amounts of hokfusine.