gray1

[grey] /greɪ/
adjective, grayer, grayest.
1.
of a color between white and black; having a neutral hue.
2.
dark, dismal, or gloomy:
gray skies.
3.
dull, dreary, or monotonous.
4.
having gray hair; gray-headed.
5.
pertaining to old age; mature.
6.
Informal. pertaining to, involving, or composed of older persons:
gray households.
7.
old or ancient.
8.
indeterminate and intermediate in character:
The tax audit concentrated on deductions in the gray area between purely personal and purely business expenses.
noun
9.
any achromatic color; any color with zero chroma, intermediate between white and black.
10.
something of this color.
11.
gray material or clothing:
to dress in gray.
12.
an unbleached and undyed condition.
13.
(often initial capital letter) a member of the Confederate army in the American Civil War or the army itself.
Compare blue (def 5).
14.
a horse of a gray color.
15.
a horse that appears white but is not an albino.
verb (used with object), verb (used without object)
16.
to make or become gray.
Also, grey.
Origin
before 900; Middle English; Old English grǣg; cognate with German grau
Related forms
grayly, adverb
grayness, noun
ungrayed, adjective

gray2

[grey] /greɪ/
noun, Physics.
1.
the standard unit of absorbed dose of radiation (such as x-rays) in the International System of Units (SI), equal to the amount of ionizing radiation absorbed when the energy imparted to matter is 1 J/kg (one joule per kilogram).
Abbreviation: Gy.
Compare rad
Origin
1975; named in honor of Louis Harold Gray (1905-65), English radiobiologist

Gray

[grey] /greɪ/
noun
1.
Asa
[ey-suh] /ˈeɪ sə/ (Show IPA), 1810–88, U.S. botanist.
2.
Robert, 1755–1806, U.S. explorer and sea captain: discovered the Columbia River.
3.
Thomas, 1716–71, English poet.
Examples from the web for gray
  • Such familiarity has inspired a long list of colloquial names for the gray jay.
  • In gray jays, however, nonbreeders do not help their parents to raise younger siblings.
  • The gray version, which was the first, was the rarer of the two.
  • The pallium is a layer of gray matter that lies on the surface of the forebrain.
  • Stylistically, rap occupies a gray area among speech, prose, poetry, and song.
  • However, the saddle patches of transients are solid and uniformly gray.
  • The dominant uniform style thereafter was gray under a pattern of squares.
  • Bark dark gray brown tinged with red, deeply furrowed, surface inclined to scale.
  • The cerebellum contains similar gray and white matter divisions as the cerebrum.
  • The gray wolf and the cougar compete more directly for prey, especially in winter.
British Dictionary definitions for gray

gray1

/ɡreɪ/
adjective, noun, verb
1.
a variant spelling (now esp US) of grey
Derived Forms
grayish, adjective
grayly, adverb
grayness, noun

gray2

/ɡreɪ/
noun
1.
the derived SI unit of absorbed ionizing radiation dose or kerma equivalent to an absorption per unit mass of one joule per kilogram of irradiated material. 1 gray is equivalent to 100 rads Gy
Word Origin
C20: named after Louis Harold Gray (1905–65), English physicist

Gray

/ɡreɪ/
noun
1.
Thomas. 1716–71, English poet, best known for his Elegy written in a Country Churchyard (1751)

grey

/ɡreɪ/
adjective
1.
of a neutral tone, intermediate between black and white, that has no hue and reflects and transmits only a little light
2.
greyish in colour or having parts or marks that are greyish
3.
dismal or dark, esp from lack of light; gloomy
4.
neutral or dull, esp in character or opinion
5.
having grey hair
6.
of or relating to people of middle age or above: grey power
7.
ancient; venerable
8.
(of textiles) natural, unbleached, undyed, and untreated
noun
9.
any of a group of grey tones
10.
grey cloth or clothing: dressed in grey
11.
an animal, esp a horse, that is grey or whitish
verb
12.
to become or make grey
Derived Forms
greyish, (mainly US) grayish, adjective
greyly, (mainly US) grayly, adverb
greyness, (mainly US) grayness, noun
Word Origin
Old English grǣg; related to Old High German grāo, Old Norse grar
Word Origin and History for gray
adj.

Old English græg (Mercian grei), from Proto-Germanic *grisja- "gray" (cf. Old Norse grar, Old Frisian gre, Middle Dutch gra, Dutch graw, Old High German grao, German grau), with no certain cognates outside Germanic. French gris, Spanish gris, Italian grigio, Medieval Latin griseus are Germanic loan-words.

The distinction between British grey and U.S. gray developed 20c. The noun is c.1200, from the adjective. Gray as figurative for "Southern troops in the U.S. Civil War" is first recorded 1863, in reference to their uniform color. Expression the gray mare is the better horse in reference to households ruled by wives is recorded from 1540s. The verb is 1610s (with an isolated instance from late 14c.). Related: Grayed; graying.

gray in Medicine

gray (grā)
n.
Abbr. Gy
A unit for a specific absorbed dose of radiation equal to 100 rads.

Gray (grā), Henry. 1825?-1861.

British anatomist whose work Anatomy, Descriptive and Surgical (1858), known as Gray's Anatomy, remains a standard text.

gray in Science
gray
  (grā)   
The SI derived unit used to measure the energy absorbed by a substance per unit weight of the substance when exposed to radiation. One gray is equal to one joule per kilogram, or 100 rads. The gray is named after British physicist Louis Harold Gray (1905-1965).
gray in Technology

A parser generator written in Forth by Martin Anton Ertl anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at. Gray takes grammars in an extended BNF and produces executable Forth code for recursive descent parsers. There is no special support for error handling. Version 3 runs under Tile Forth Release 2 by Mikael Patel.
(1992-05-22)
Idioms and Phrases with gray

gray

also see:
get gray hair from
Encyclopedia Article for gray

unit of absorbed dose of ionizing radiation, defined in the 1980s by the International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurements. One gray is equal approximately to the absorbed dose delivered when the energy per unit mass imparted to matter by ionizing radiation is one joule per kilogram. As a unit of measure, the gray is coherent with the units of measure in the International System of Units (SI). The gray replaced the rad, which was not coherent with the SI system. One gray equals 100 rads

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