hibernate

• hivernate, hybernate (both obsolete)

From Latin hībernātus, from hībernāre, from hībernus (“winter”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈhaɪbəˌneɪt/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

hibernate (third-person singular simple present hibernates, present participle hibernating, simple past and past participle hibernated)

1. (intransitive, biology) To spend the winter in a dormant or inactive state of minimal activity, low body temperature, slow breathing and heart rate, and low metabolic rate; to go through a winter sleep.

   Coordinate term: estivate

   Hedgehogs and bears are two of the many mammals that hibernate in winter.

   • 2014, Elizabeth Kolbert, chapter 8, in The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, Henry Holt and Company:

     Organisms have developed all sorts of ways of dealing with these variations. They hibernate or estivate or migrate.

2. (intransitive) To live in seclusion.
3. (intransitive, computing) To enter a standby state which conserves power without losing the contents of memory.
   • 2001, Microsoft Corp, Use Hibernate and Standby to Conserve Batteries

     Your computer hibernates after it has been idle for the specified amount of time.

• hibernal
• hibernation
• hibernator

• oversummer
• overwinter

• breathe in, inbreathe

hībernāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of hībernō