dead zone

plural dead zones

1. An area with no life.

   1 more example

   Its first act upon its arrival — or, depending on the degree of intelligent agency you ascribed to it, the first side-effect of its arrival — was the neutralisation of the Foundation. In the space of a night, an international staff of tens of thousands disappeared into oblivion, or became amnesiac, or simply dropped brain-dead where they were standing. Foundation Sites became hollow, inaccessible dead zones. A few anomalies broke containment in the chaos, to devastating effect; thousands of others were choked into irrelevant obscurity beneath SCP-3125's antimemetic pressure.

   26 August 2019, qntm, “Unthreaded”, in There Is No Antimemetics Division, →ISBN, pages 161–162

2. biologyAn area of the ocean where oxygen levels are too low to support life, especially as a result of pollution.

   Planet Earth Research this year discovered that humans have created at least 50 ‘dead zones’ (zones where there is no oxygen) in the sea through pollution, and have extinguished other species at 1,000 times the natural rate in evolution.

   1999 December 26, The Observer

   2 more examples

   It is only really in the past decade that science has begun to tell us that the man-made changes now occurring in the oceans – from acidification to overfishing to the growth of dead zones – represent some of the greatest threats to life on Earth.

   2012, Charles Clover, ‘Up To Our Necks’, Literary Review, number 399

   By the time the Mississippi enters the gulf, its current has been transformed into a conduit for chemical nutrients, and this enriched current stimulates massive blooms of phytoplanktons. Consequently, it forms a dead zone the size of Massachusetts (7,900 square miles or 20,461 square kilometers) every summer, which has existed since the 1970s and supports almost no life beyond phytoplankton and bacteria.

   2014, Chris Maser, Interactions of Land, Ocean and Humans: A Global Perspective, CRC Press, →ISBN, page 118

3. communicationsA region where mobile phones do not operate because there is no base station or repeater nearby.

   When you are in a dead zone, most of your call drops or your phone doesn't work at all.

   2005, Andrew Mennen, It's Your Call: The Complete Guide to Mobile Phones, Relianz Communications Pty Ltd, →ISBN, page 74

   Synonyms: notspot

4. gridiron footballhobbiesThe part of the field where a player is on their opponent's side of the field but kicking a field goal would probably be unsuccessful and punting the ball would not dramatically change field position.
5. historicalgovernmentAn area near a fortification that is relatively sheltered from defending fire because direct fire from other parts of the walls cannot be directed around a curved wall.
6. video gamesA region within the player's viewpoint that is less sensitive to small movements, aiding accurate firing of weapons etc.