lethal gene
noun
Simple meaning
Any gene that has an effect that causes the death of the organism at any stage of life.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
leethuhljeenSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈliθəldʒin
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
Any gene that has an effect that causes the death of the organism at any stage of life
Any gene that brings about the death of an organism carrying it; usually the result of a mutation.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: Any gene that has an effect that causes the death of the organism at any stage of life
Used this way, lethal gene is a specialist word with a clearly unfavourable pull. This is a scientific use: it names something precisely within a field of study, so it appears in research and teaching more than in conversation.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Clinical and detached
Where it naturally appears
- Science
- Academic writing
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.