Methane

English

Noun

Methane (countable and uncountable; plural Methanes)

1. (organic chemistry, uncountable) The simplest aliphatic hydrocarbon, CH₄, being a constituent of natural gas.

   Cattle emit a large amount of methane.

2. (organic chemistry, countable) Any of very many derivatives of methane.

Synonyms

• methyl hydride (appears in some chemistry literature)
• carbon tetrahydride (rare, systematic name)

Thesaurus

alcohol, benzine, briquette, burnable, butane, carbon, charcoal, coal, coke, combustible, dope, ethane, ethanol, fireball, firing, flammable, flammable material, fuel, fuel additive, fuel dope, gas, gas carbon, gasoline, heptane, hexane, inflammable, inflammable material, isooctane, jet fuel, kerosene, methanol, natural gas, octane, oil, paraffin, peat, pentane, propane, propellant, rocket fuel, turf

Etymology

From methyl + -ane.

Pronunciation

• (Canada) IPA: /ˈmɛθɛɪn/
• (RP) IPA: /ˈmiːθeɪn/
• (US) enPR: mĕth'ān, IPA: /ˈmɛθeɪn/, SAMPA: /"mETeIn/

• Audio (UK)

  noicon

  (file)

• Audio (US)

  noicon

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛθeɪn

Translations

the compound CH₄

Breton: metan (br) m. Catalan: metà (ca) m. Chinese: 甲烷 (cmn) (jiǎ wán) Czech: metan (cs) m. Dutch: methaan (nl) n. Esperanto: metano (eo) Finnish: metaani (fi) German: Methan (de) n. Greek: μεθάνιο (el) (methánio) n.

Italian: metano (it) Japanese: メタン (ja) (metan) Korean: 메탄 (ko) (metan) Latin: methanum (la) Norwegian: metan (no) n. Polish: metan (pl) m. Romanian: metan (ro) n. Russian: метан (ru) (metán) m. Spanish: metano (es) m. Swedish: metan (sv) n.

Anagrams

• meaneth

References

• “methane” in the Online Etymology Dictionary, Douglas Harper, 2001