foam
pronunciation
How to pronounce foam in British English:
UK [fəʊm]
How to pronounce foam in American English:
US [foʊm]
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- Noun:
- a mass of small bubbles formed in or on a liquid
- a lightweight material in cellular form; made by introducing gas bubbles during manufacture
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- Verb:
- form bubbles
Word Origin
- foam
- foam: [OE] Foam is an ancient word, with several relatives widespread among the Indo-European languages, all denoting generally ‘substance made up of bubbles’: Latin pūmex, for instance, from which English gets pumice, and probably Latin spūma, from which we get spume [14]. These and other forms, such as Sanskrit phénas and Russian pena ‘foam’, point to a common Indo-European source *poimo-, which produced prehistoric West Germanic *faimaz – whence English foam.=> pumice, spume
- foam (n.)
- Middle English fom, fome (c. 1300), from Old English fam "foam, saliva froth; sea," from West Germanic *faimo- (cognates: Old High German veim, German Feim), from PIE root *(s)poi-mo- "foam, froth" (cognates: Sanskrit phenah; Latin pumex "pumice," spuma "foam;" Old Church Slavonic pena "foam;" Lithuanian spaine "a streak of foam"). The plastic variety used in packaging, etc., so called from 1937.
- foam (v.)
- Old English famgian "to emit foam, to boil," from the source of foam (n.). Sense of "become foamy, to froth" is from late 14c. Transitive sense is from 1725. Related: Foamed; foaming.
Example
- 1. Out of foam core , using a laser cutter .
- 2. The balloon was covered by pieces of foam plastic with two holes for lenses of two cameras .
- 3. But meyers discovered that the foam is actually a complicated network of tiny scaffolds and thin membranes .
- 4. White foam from the water sprayed the road .
- 5. When the liquids have almost evaporated , you can see the foam subsiding .