Meanings
- uncountablegeographyThe activity, and associated phenomena, of a cryovolcano – a volcano that ejects volatile materials rather than magma.
Cryovolcanism helped explain odd features on moons of Saturn and Uranus as well.
1990 August, Rick Gore, “Neptune: Voyager's Last Picture Show”, in National Geographic, volume 178, number 2, page 472 more examples
Sites of cryovolcanisms on the surface, where this ammonia and water mixture reaches the surface, are possible locations for life that lives in liquid water but can tolerate ammonia.
2009, Robert Brown, Jean Pierre Lebreton, Jack Waite, Titan from Cassini-Huygens, Springer Science & Business Media, →ISBN, page 228Possible explanations include floods of liquid water, ice-based volcanic activity (termed cryovolcanism), or even some form of tectonic system. […] Voyager also found evidence of cryovolcanism on Neptune's moon Triton.
2015 March 12, John Timmer, “Jupiter’s moon Ganymede has a salty subsurface ocean, too”, in Ars Technica
Origin
- Ancient Greekκρῠ́ος (krŭ́os)
- Englishcryo-
- Englishvolcanism
- Englishcryovolcanism
Cite this entry
cryovolcanism. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cryovolcanism
“cryovolcanism.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cryovolcanism. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “cryovolcanism,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cryovolcanism.
Source: cryovolcanism on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.