diapause

noun

dia·​pause ˈdī-ə-ˌpȯz 

: a period of physiologically enforced dormancy between periods of activity

Did you know?

Diapause, from the Greek word diapausis, meaning "pause," may have been coined by the entomologist William Wheeler in 1893. Wheeler's focus was insects, but diapause, a spontaneous period of suspended animation that seems to happen in response to adverse environmental conditions, also occurs in the development of crustaceans, snails, and other animals. Exercising poetic license, novelist Joyce Carol Oates even gave the word a human application in her short story "Visitation Rights" (1988): "Her life, seemingly in shambles, ... was not ruined; ... injured perhaps, and surely stunted, but only temporarily. There had been a diapause, and that was all...."

Examples of diapause in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Some mammal species have an ability known as embryonic diapause, in which the development of an embryo can be paused for weeks or even months, keeping the blastocyst from implanting in the uterus. —Michael Irving, New Atlas, 3 Oct. 2024

As the day get shorter in light, flies should enter diapause. —Erin Couch, The Enquirer, 8 Sep. 2024

The aquarium clarified in a statement last month that Charlotte may not have been pregnant to begin with, but rather suffered from a reproductive disease known as diapause. —Jeff A. Chamer, Charlotte Observer, 1 July 2024

Scientists were working on a study on bumblebee diapause. —Popular Science Staff, Popular Science, 22 May 2024

The queens then mate and store up a bunch of nutrients before digging down into little burrows in the soil and going into diapause for six to nine months. —Popular Science Staff, Popular Science, 22 May 2024

The work includes monitoring greenhouse temperatures and humidity, growing and picking food for the caterpillars each day, and early in the year, watching for when the caterpillars awake from diapause. —Krista Stevens, Longreads, 28 Feb. 2024

To replicate diapause at the zoo, the Aquatic and Reptile care team housed this latest egg in a wine chiller, as recommended by the Smithsonian National Zoo, which had two successful hatchings in 2015. —Brittany Truong, USA TODAY, 28 June 2023

It's called embryonic diapause. —Briana Rice, The Enquirer, 18 Mar. 2021

Word History

Etymology

Greek diapausis pause, from diapauein to pause, from dia- + pauein to stop

First Known Use

1893, in the meaning defined above

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Kids Definition

diapause

noun

dia·​pause ˈdī-ə-ˌpȯz 

: a period (as in some insects) in which development slows down or in which bodily activities are decreased

Medical Definition

diapause

noun

dia·​pause ˈdī-ə-ˌpȯz 

: a period of physiologically enforced dormancy between periods of activity