CARBONIC ACID • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Carbonic acid

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adjective

Carbonic adj. (Chem.) Of, pertaining to, or obtained from, carbon; as, carbonic oxide.

Carbonic acid (Chem.), an acid HO.CO.OH, not existing separately, which, combined with positive or basic atoms or radicals, forms carbonates. In common language the term is very generally applied to a compound of carbon and oxygen, CO2, more correctly called carbon dioxide. It is a colorless, heavy, irrespirable gas, extinguishing flame, and when breathed destroys life. It can be reduced to a liquid and solid form by intense pressure. It is produced in the fermentation of liquors, and by the combustion and decomposition of organic substances, or other substances containing carbon. It is formed in the explosion of fire damp in mines, and is hence called after damp; it is also know as choke damp, and mephitic air. Water will absorb its own volume of it, and more than this under pressure, and in this state becomes the common soda water of the shops, and the carbonated water of natural springs. Combined with lime it constitutes limestone, or common marble and chalk. Plants imbibe it for their nutrition and growth, the carbon being retained and the oxygen given out.

Carbonic oxide (Chem.), a colorless gas, CO, of a light odor, called more correctly carbon monoxide. It is almost the only definitely known compound in which carbon seems to be divalent. It is a product of the incomplete combustion of carbon, and is an abundant constituent of water gas. It is fatal to animal life, extinguishes combustion, and burns with a pale blue flame, forming carbon dioxide.

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Etymology of 'Carbonic acid'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Carbonic acid" Quotes from Famous Books

... the lungs, which represent a part of the surface, the oxygen of the air, which is indispensable for the life of the cells, is taken into the body and carbonic acid removed. The interchange of gases is effected by the blood, which, enclosed in innumerable, small, thin-walled tubes, almost covers the surface, and comes in contact with the air within the lungs, taking from it oxygen and ...

— Disease and Its Causes • William Thomas Councilman

... stage-ridden and bewildered all day, and when we swept down with the darkness into the Arcadian hamlet of "Wingdam," I resolved to go no farther, and rolled out in a gloomy and dyspeptic state. The effects of a mysterious pie, and some sweetened carbonic acid known to the proprietor of the "Half-Way House" as "lemming sody," still oppressed me. Even the facetiae of the gallant expressman who knew everybody's Christian name along the route, who rained letters, newspapers, and bundles from the top of the stage, ...

— Legends and Tales • Bret Harte

... quite done with you. [Rising and holding up the sketch block] There! While youve been talking, Ive been doing. What is there left of your moralizing? Only a little carbonic acid gas which makes the room unhealthy. What is there left of my work? That. Look at it [Ridgeon rises to ...

— The Doctor's Dilemma • George Bernard Shaw

... scientific thought, seem to point to the conclusion that the difference between them and ordinary shooting-stars is analogous to that between rain and mist, and, in addition to the reasons already given for connecting them with comets, may be mentioned the fact that meteorites bring with them carbonic acid, which is known to form so prominent a part of comets' tails; and if fragments of meteoric iron or stone be heated moderately in a vacuum, they yield up gases consisting of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen, and the spectrum of these gases ...

— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly

... have no right to forbid Nature to act differently in worlds from which carbon is absent. A world, for example, in which silica replaces carbon, silicic acid carbonic acid, might be inhabited by organisms absolutely different from those which exist on the Earth, different not only in form, but also in substance. We already know stars and suns for which spectral analysis reveals a predominance of silica, e.g., Rigel and Deneb. In a world ...

— Astronomy for Amateurs • Camille Flammarion

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