# atmosphere
## English
### Alternative forms

* atmosphære (archaic)

### Etymology

Borrowed from French atmosphère, from New Latin atmosphaera, from Ancient Greek ἀτμός (atmós, “steam”) + σφαῖρα (sphaîra, “sphere”); corresponding to atmo- +‎ -sphere.

### Pronunciation

* (UK) IPA: /ˈæt.məsˌfɪə(ɹ)/
* Audio (UK):(file)
* (US) IPA: /ˈætməsˌfɪɹ/
* Audio (US):(file)
* (India, spelling pronunciation) IPA: /ətˈmɒsˌfɪə(ɾ)/
* Hyphenation: at‧mos‧phere

### Noun

atmosphere (countable and uncountable, plural atmospheres)
* The gases surrounding the Earth or any astronomical body.
    Meronyms: see Thesaurus:atmosphere
    Coordinate terms: hydrosphere, biosphere
** 1988 April 14, Richard Fifield, “Frozen assets of the ice cores”, in New Scientist, number 1608, page 28:To most people, the huge ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland are merely water that once was snow. To glaciologists and climatologists, they are storehouses of the Earth's former atmospheres.
* The air in a particular place.
** 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter I, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 2:The last hue of crimson had died away in the west, and the depth of the rich purple atmosphere was unbroken.
** 1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter I, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0016:Thus the red damask curtains which now shut out the fog-laden, drizzling atmosphere of the Marylebone Road, had cost a mere song, and yet they might have been warranted to last another thirty years. A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor; […].
* (figuratively) The conditions (such as music, illumination etc.) that can influence the mood felt in an environment.
    Synonyms: air, ambiance
* (figuratively) The apparent mood felt in an environment.
    Synonyms: feeling, mood
** 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, Canto XX, page 33:For by the hearth the children sit ⁠Cold in that atmosphere of Death, ⁠And scarce endure to draw the breath, Or like to noiseless phantoms flit: […]
** 1984, Ben Findon, Eddie Tucker, Steve Rodway (lyrics and music), “Atmosphere”, in I Love a Party, performed by Russ Abbot:Oh, what an atmosphere / I love a party with a happy atmosphere
* A unit of measurement for pressure equal to 101325 Pa (symbol: atm), approximately the atmospheric pressure at sea level.
** 1959, The Canadian Patent Office Record and Register of Copyrights‎, volume 87, page 6658:A process for preparing normally solid high molecular weight, hydrocarbon polymers which comprises heating and reacting carbon monoxide with hydrogen at a temperature of 125 ° to 350 °C, under a pressure of at least 30 atmospheres and in contact with a phosphomolybdic compound represented by the formula P$_2$Mo$_{20–24}$O$_{2–60}$.
* (television, film, uncountable) Extras in a scene who have no spoken lines.
** 2006, Los Angeles Magazine, volume 51, number 2, page 100:Central Casting is in the business of extras, also known as atmosphere or background actors […]
** 2013, Kerry Segrave, Extras of Early Hollywood: A History of the Crowd, 1913-1945, page 38:"It is estimated conservatively that there are some 50,000 would-be film extras in and around the celluloid capital, persons who would jump at the opportunity to appear as atmosphere in pictures," Scott concluded.
** 2015, William R. Phillippe, The Pastor's Diary:By the way, I discovered that we were not extras but background, as far as the director was concerned; and for the producer, we were atmosphere.

#### Derived terms

* atmosphered
* atmosphereless
* atmospherical
* atmospherization
* atmospherology
* controlled atmosphere
* endoatmosphere
* exoatmosphere
* lower atmosphere
* middle atmosphere
* modified atmosphere
* palaeoatmosphere
* paleoatmosphere
* protoatmosphere
* subatmosphere
* you could cut the atmosphere with a knife

#### Related terms

* atmospheric
* atmospherics

#### See also

* ambiance, ambience
* mood