Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
potentially
adverb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
potentially explosive
▪ He’s good at defusing potentially explosive situations.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADJECTIVE
available
▪ The above strategies are potentially available for resolving the tension between word order and communicative function.
▪ It is one of the few federal programs from which large budget savings are potentially available.
▪ Learning is a strategy that is potentially available, but its use is often prohibited by lack of time and money.
▪ The number of varieties that are potentially available can be infinitely large.
▪ Each language has its own phraseology, its own idiom which rules out many options that are potentially available as grammatical sequences.
▪ Or is it a universal meaning that is potentially available to all but in practice is available only to the structuralist?
damaging
▪ This offered the temptation to Government to use section 2 to protect itself against potentially damaging disclosures.
▪ As the currency markets know only too well, a potentially damaging row over interest-rate policy has broken out.
▪ Safety U/V light is potentially damaging to the eyes, and you should never look directly at a lit-up tube.
▪ Some recorded comments would be merely offensive if they were not so potentially damaging.
▪ I shall argue that this conception is not only philosophically problematic, but also has an implicit politics which is potentially damaging.
▪ By balancing your calcium intake at an early age, your bones are better prepared for these potentially damaging changes.
▪ The precision high speed cutting rollers are also to be protected from potentially damaging metal fragments by metal detectors.
▪ It is potentially damaging to children's health and development.
dangerous
▪ B12 and magnesium appear to be less potentially dangerous, but according to studies are less effective.
▪ Failure to share information is potentially dangerous.
▪ Gradually the voluntary churches thus came to be safety valves for society, means of draining potentially dangerous conflict into harmless channels.
▪ They are also prominent in investigating potentially dangerous occurrences in the day's routine.
▪ It is a scouting reconnaissance into un-known and potentially dangerous territory.
▪ Are you fitting anything which may be potentially dangerous or impair the performance of items such as brakes, steering, etc.?
▪ Moving patients in iron lungs even within a hospital was laborious and potentially dangerous.
deadly
▪ Read in studio Oxfam is trying to recall seven thousand potentially deadly necklaces on sale in its shops.
▪ Folic acid, a B vitamin, reduces heart-attack risks by lowering a potentially deadly blood chemical called homocysteine.
▪ In the wrong hands - maybe even my own - it is potentially deadly.
▪ These tips also help prevent heat exhaustion, only several cases of which advance to potentially deadly heat stroke at the Canyon.
difficult
▪ And Mr Major happily used freelance fixers like Mr Wakeham to defuse potentially difficult committee meetings.
▪ It was an easy way of keeping a potentially difficult parent quiet.
▪ At the studio Here are some guidelines for in-studio behaviour and some tips on handling potentially difficult interviews.
▪ Dischargers are regarded as potentially difficult people.
disastrous
▪ The implications of such a view were potentially disastrous for positivist criminology.
▪ An investigation of the causes of the charring, a potentially disastrous situation, is under way.
▪ Better that negotiations should break down than such difficulties be suppressed: a merger which fails is potentially disastrous.
▪ Colds, flu or any ailment that diminishes vocal stamina and luster are potentially disastrous.
▪ It is important that the profession makes the public aware that the effect of increasing understaffing is potentially disastrous.
▪ The silly boy might have made potentially disastrous mistakes, but he had preserved the basis of his claim.
explosive
▪ Such testimony, unheard of in El Salvador, is potentially explosive in a state that has tried to bury its past.
▪ Their presence in the alliance masks deep and potentially explosive differences.
▪ Thus there was a combination of potentially explosive contributory factors.
▪ The most potentially explosive area of contact between headquarters and the Boards was in financial control.
fatal
▪ This time though, the damage was potentially fatal.
▪ It is standard medical practice here not to tell the patient about potentially fatal illnesses, especially cancer.
▪ Some were present in potentially fatal quantities.
▪ In the doorway stands 2-year-old Davell Payne, a few feet from a potentially fatal tumble down the stairwell.
▪ Enterocolitis is one of the rare but potentially fatal manifestations of gold toxicity.
▪ These include the more firmly established association between the drugs and a potentially fatal lung disease, primary pulmonary hypertension.
▪ Recently I have experienced serious and potentially fatal fevers.
▪ Preeclampsia is a potentially fatal condition that usually strikes in the last trimester of pregnancy.
harmful
▪ These kinds of exemptions were regarded as potentially harmful by organizations such as the Royal Town Planning Institute.
▪ And the child accidentally receives a greater and potentially harmful dosage of pain reliever.
▪ The creation of the Premier League is therefore irrelevant and potentially harmful.
▪ They admit the treatment for changing the color of your skin is potentially harmful and not very effective.
▪ This is not to say that lower gliadin doses are not potentially harmful to coeliac disease subjects.
▪ When Delaney offered his amendment, scientists could identify traces of potentially harmful substances down to a level of parts per million.
▪ The intact skin acts as a barrier between the internal and the external environment which contains many potentially harmful agents.
▪ The tyres contain only low levels of carbon and no dioxins; potentially harmful products of burning tyres are to be recycled.
hazardous
▪ What is important is that all the chlorine in the VOCs ends up as chloride ion rather than other potentially hazardous chlorinated compounds.
▪ He considers such maneuverings a ridiculous way to run a government and still potentially hazardous to the credit markets here and abroad.
▪ However, many potentially hazardous chemical installations are not covered by such regulations.
▪ Start to phase out nuclear fission power stations, which are prohibitively expensive and potentially hazardous.
▪ Health and health studies Taxes on addictive and potentially hazardous products like tobacco and alcohol produce a dual effect.
▪ Safety All products are potentially hazardous even detergents.
▪ If the conditions were such during trial that an actual or potentially hazardous situation arose questions of safety predominate.
▪ With a nuclear station decommissioning was a lengthy, expensive and potentially hazardous enterprise.
high
▪ These sweeter grapes produce rich, fruity wines with a potentially higher level of alcohol.
▪ These are less safe than with-profits policies but they offer the attraction of potentially higher investment returns.
▪ GeoRef assigns more subject headings for each record, and so has potentially higher recall by subject search.
▪ Competition is potentially high - if it's easy why can't everybody do it?
▪ However, through the application of good engineering we have minimized the potentially high cost increases.
important
▪ So far, research into psychoneuroimmunology has done no more than scratch the surface of this potentially important topic.
▪ The general practitioner has a potentially important role in the prevention of attempted suicide.
▪ This distinction appears potentially important and one which in turn generates other questions.
▪ Both intimate and friendship ties are therefore considered potentially important for well-being.
▪ Some were suspects and others were potentially important witnesses.
▪ A quieter but potentially important project is currently under way by Sir John Boreham who has been seconded from the government statistical office.
▪ Carol Wilson was a potentially important witness on this point.
▪ We judged this to be a potentially important finding in view of the extremely widespread use of cimetidine.
lethal
▪ Police in Gloucestershire have made their first seizure of the potentially lethal drug.
▪ Salesmen warning DOOR-TO-DOOR salesmen are posing as Fire Brigade representatives to sell potentially lethal fire extinguishers, it has been disclosed.
▪ This is a potentially lethal combination, but modern techniques help to safeguard us from those risks.
▪ A Green Party spokesman said that spent fuel rods are highly radioactive and potentially lethal.
▪ They're lovely to look at, but remember that old Christmas tree lights are potentially lethal.
▪ They say they come across thousands of examples of potentially lethal appliances.
▪ He'd had more than enough of her reckless approach to potentially lethal situations.
lucrative
▪ Skirmishes are already going on as rivals battle to gain control of potentially lucrative new domains such as.pro.
▪ Fielding much of the potentially lucrative interest in McCarthy, D-N.
▪ These are potentially lucrative crops, but they involve enormous inputs of capital and expensive investment in irrigation.
▪ If form holds, the pros' tips will be intriguing, well-researched and potentially lucrative.
▪ The details remain unclear, but the scuffle is probably best described as potentially lucrative for Mr Tyler.
powerful
▪ New powers to refuse wastes and revoke licences are potentially powerful weapons in controlling the movement and safe disposal of wastes.
▪ The project contains several intriguing and potentially powerful matchups.
▪ The real menace is the right shoulder, which at the top of the backswing adopts a potentially powerful position.
▪ I saw all these new women lawyers as a potentially powerful support base for effective feminist activism.
relevant
▪ Building it in is hard because the amount of knowledge which is potentially relevant to decoding each pronoun, is extremely large.
▪ At least, therefore, for such groups, the portfolio matrices and their separable SBUs are potentially relevant concepts.
▪ They mean that a much wider range of material is potentially relevant, and they generate increasing literatures of their own.
▪ The potentially relevant data are essentially unlimited.
serious
▪ A structural appraisal of the building identified a number of potentially serious defects which could arise in the event of fire.
▪ Neonatal convulsion is an uncommon problem but one that is potentially serious.
▪ Boston employers are facing an acute labour shortage with potentially serious consequences for economic growth.
▪ Examples of athletes with painful and potentially serious injuries who have continued to compete are almost innumerable.
▪ In the most potentially serious accident, a ski-rack came off worse than the out-of-control 10-year-old who hit it.
▪ It has been recognised that without sufficient processing capacity a potentially serious waste problem could arise.
▪ This could have potentially serious consequences where these waters are used for drinking.
significant
▪ A third appraisal of this potentially significant heavy oil field will be drilled in 1993.
▪ Used prudently, advanced hybrid or bio-engineered crop strains could make a potentially significant contribution to third world agriculture.
▪ The implications of this are potentially significant.
▪ This is potentially significant for athletes because they are exercising so hard that their muscles readily burn the liberated fatty acids.
▪ However a small scattering of calibrated stations could provide an interesting and potentially significant source of scientific date on radio propagation.
▪ However, I wish to address one potentially significant impact of the Act in relation to secure accommodation applications in civil proceedings.
▪ These issues are far from resolved and affect our interpretation of some potentially significant findings.
▪ Ideally, scanning is aimed at alerting the organisation to potentially significant external impingements before they have fully formed or crystallised.
useful
▪ Management awareness profiles are potentially useful, but mechanisms to make them effective in changing behaviour are still to be developed.
▪ What if he died and took the potentially useful secret to the grave with him?
▪ In total such ponds are clearly another potentially useful wintering ground for wildfowl, and more information is needed about such sites.
▪ Another potentially useful system for laboratory study could well be the various steps in prostaglandin synthesis.
▪ Then other potentially useful agents, the ex-military, and teachers, will be examined.
▪ In addition, a number of potentially useful pieces of information were identified.
valuable
▪ What was a potentially valuable, or at least useful, asset in bricks and mortar rapidly becomes a liability.
▪ Moreover, Sally may have stalled or prevented a research endeavor with potentially valuable outcomes to the organization.
▪ The conversion of houses into flats was another potentially valuable source requiring sensitive handling.
▪ Because options are potentially valuable, they are not free!
▪ It is a potentially valuable model for working with a range of client groups.
▪ Again, potentially valuable data were largely wasted because of a mistake in presentation.
▪ Methane gas from rubbish tips is another potentially valuable source of energy.
▪ Many potentially valuable programs remain unused and unexploited.
violent
▪ That prevented a potentially violent political explosion.
▪ Thirdly, there is the potentially violent gang.
▪ Units that are open to the public should develop their own procedures for dealing with potentially violent incidents.
▪ To make it possible to deal with very fast moving, or potentially violent, events.
■ VERB
damage
▪ These lenses are much smaller than ours, so less potentially damaging light reaches the sensory cells.
▪ The effects of comet and asteroid impacts are potentially damaging to life in general, and to human civilization in particular.
▪ Punitive damages potentially could be much more costly to cigarette companies than compensatory damages.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ a potentially fatal disease
▪ Sculpture workshops are potentially dangerous work sites.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ At the limit, governments are obliged to defend their currencies with interest-rate changes and potentially unlimited intervention.
▪ Building it in is hard because the amount of knowledge which is potentially relevant to decoding each pronoun, is extremely large.
▪ For this reason and no other, Gates is spending huge amounts of money to defend itself from a potentially catastrophic judgment.
▪ However, many potentially hazardous chemical installations are not covered by such regulations.
▪ The image presented was of potentially active individuals bereft both of health and satisfaction through enforced retirement from economic activity.
▪ The number of varieties that are potentially available can be infinitely large.
▪ These tips also help prevent heat exhaustion, only several cases of which advance to potentially deadly heat stroke at the Canyon.
▪ Used prudently, advanced hybrid or bio-engineered crop strains could make a potentially significant contribution to third world agriculture.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Potentially
Potentially \Po*ten"tial*ly\, adv.
With power; potently. [Obs.]
-
In a potential manner; possibly, not positively.
The duration of human souls is only potentially infinite.
--Bentley.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
potentially
adv. In a manner showing much potential; with the possibility of happening in a given way.
WordNet
potentially
adv. with a possibility of becoming actual; "introducing possibly dangerous innovations"; "he is potentially dangerous"; "potentially useful" [syn: possibly]
Wikipedia
Usage examples of "potentially".
In the opening chapter, I talked about the more than six thousand nasal swab tests that were done on those who were potentially exposed to anthrax spores on Capitol Hill.
TSA also needs to intensify its efforts to identify, track, and appropriately screen potentially dangerous cargo in both the aviation and maritime sectors.
They could ease the passage of a terrified passenger lifter, or ensure that nosy busybodies were made into asteroid sandwich, but he enjoyed the spectacle of seeing something as big and vain as the Time-span negotiating this potentially fatal dance.
Robins uncovered potentially exculpatory evidence attorneys would use in future bids to get Bembenek a new trial.
I mean, malware is potentially more than a nuisance -- emergency systems, air traffic control, and nuclear reactors all run on vulnerable software.
Jorust winked gravely at Munn and departed, looking as innocent as a cat, and as potentially dangerous.
Control of laboring activity can potentially be individualized and continuous in the virtual panopticon of network production.
Potentially, eight crossed beams could create the equivalent of a collapsium lattice, for picosecond intervals.
In sum, the unity exhibited in Being on the one hand approximates to Unity-Absolute and on the other tends to identify itself with Being: Being is a unity in relation to the Absolute, is Being by virtue of its sequence upon that Absolute: it is indeed potentially a plurality, and yet it remains a unity and rejecting division refuses thereby to become a genus.
In cyberspace there are a wide variety of mental health resources, including support groups, informational websites, assessment and psychotherapeutic software, and comprehensive self-help programs - not to mention the potentially therapeutic nature of online relationships and communities as social microcosms.
Jenny mourned the loss of the sexual adrenaline that had her on edge in the racquetball court and again at the window a few moments ago watching the free show across the courtyard before things ventured into a potentially frightening dimension.
The wires will have to be rebound into bundles in order to be reinserted and render the burners even potentially workable, but my uncle has no tool for binding.
Why have I a scunner against Esme that I try to fight down as unworthy and potentially mischievous?
Personally, I find Shamsheer a much more fascinating and potentially useful world than Karyx.
An unimaginative approach, and potentially expensive: it could cost them one of their low-flying boats to locate each Swatter position.