erosion

[ ih-roh-zhuhn ]

noun

1. the act or state of eroding; state of being eroded.
2. the process by which the surface of the earth is worn away by the action of water, glaciers, winds, waves, etc.
3. the gradual decline or disintegration of something:

   Each candidate is blaming the other’s party for the erosion of international trade.

erosion

/ ɪˈrəʊʒən /

noun

1. the wearing away of rocks and other deposits on the earth's surface by the action of water, ice, wind, etc
2. the act or process of eroding or the state of being eroded

erosion

/ ĭ-rō′zhən /

1. The gradual wearing away of land surface materials, especially rocks, sediments, and soils, by the action of water, wind, or a glacier. Usually erosion also involves the transport of eroded material from one place to another, as from the top of a mountain to an adjacent valley, or from the upstream portion of a river to the downstream portion.

erosion

1. A type of weathering in which surface soil and rock are worn away through the action of glaciers , water, and wind.

Derived Forms

• eˈrosive, adjective

Other Words From

• e·ro·sion·al adjective
• an·ti·e·ro·sion adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of erosion¹

First recorded in 1535–45; from Latin ērōsiōn- (stem of ērōsiō ), derivative of ērōdere “to gnaw, eat away”; erode, -ion

Example Sentences

The images submitted will be added to an interactive map to help researchers document flood and erosion risks in coastal areas.

From Los Angeles Times

For the purposes of the project, the best photos are taken in areas susceptible to flooding and erosion, and where water levels can be gauged against identifiable landmarks such as cliffs, rocks, roads, buildings, bridge supports, sea walls, staircases and piers.

From Los Angeles Times

In the name of war, this century has seen an astonishing erosion of constraints on that very power, as Yale law professor Harold Hongju Koh details in his illuminating new book, "The National Security Constitution in the Twenty-First Century."

From Salon

“Under Trump, higher education in the US will face a difficult future, featuring an aggressive and intrusive federal government, erosion in funding with no alternatives, a cavalcade of political litmus tests and a decline in the US’s science and technology capability,” wrote John Aubrey Douglass, a senior research fellow and research professor of public policy and higher education at the UC Berkeley Center for Studies in Higher Education.

From Los Angeles Times

But broadly speaking, any elevation of Kennedy to executive power—even hypothetical—signals the further erosion of any kind of facts-based decisionmaking, and points to Trump’s embrace not just of falsehoods that benefit him politically but nonsense in general.

From Slate

Related Words

• corrosion
• decrease
• destruction
• disintegration