terraform v.

to transform (an environment or planet) by terraforming n.

  • 1942 J. Williamson Collision Orbit in Astounding Science-Fiction July 82/1 page image Jack Williamson bibliography

    He had been the original claimant of Obania, forty years ago; and Drake was the young spatial engineer he employed to terraform the little rock, only two kilometers through—by sinking a shaft to its heart for the paragravity installation, generating oxygen and water from mineral oxides, releasing absorptive gases to trap the feeble heat of the far-off Sun.

  • 1942 J. Williamson Collision Orbit in Astounding Science-Fiction July 90/1 page image Jack Williamson bibliography

    Rick was impressed to discover that Pallas, capital of all the Mandate, was not yet completely terraformed—although the city and a score of mining centers had their own paragravity units a few miles beneath the surface, there was as yet no peegee installation at the center of gravity.

  • 1949 ‘W. Stewart’ Seetee Shock in Astounding Science Fiction Feb. 37/1 page image Jack Williamson bibliography

    Once old Bruce O'Banion…hired Jim Drake to terraform it.

  • 1974 L. Niven & J. Pournelle Mote in God’s Eye (1975) i. iv. 33 Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle bibliography

    The middle two planets are inhabited, both terraformed by First Empire scientists after Jasper Murcheson.

  • 1980 D. Brin Sundiver v.xiv. 154 David Brin

    Their latest crackpot scheme is a joint project with the VietAms and Israel-APU to try to terraform Venus.

  • 1988 A. M. Steele in G. Dozois Isaac Asimov’s Mars (1991) 3

    Well, it’s no secret that life at Arsia Base was rough. Always will be rough, or at least until someone gets around to terraforming Mars, which is a wild-eyed fantasy if you ask me.

  • 1990 Thrust Winter 6/2

    Despite the certainty of many Oankali that the human ‘contradiction’ will inevitably lead to violent extinction, they will terraform Mars to provide a new start.

  • 1991 O. S. Card Xenocide viii. 138 Orson Scott Card

    So they can take it to an inhabited world, of course. Instead of finding an uninhabited planet to terraform and colonize.

  • 1992 F. Pohl Mining Oort (1993) 69, Frederik Pohl

    I studied engineering at Newcastle-on-Tyne, and I thought terraforming Mars from the Oort was the biggest, most wonderful idea anybody ever had.

  • 1993 D. Beason & K. J. Anderson Assemblers of Infinity 3737 Kevin J. Anderson Doug Beason bibliography

    Celeste McConnell had pitched to him her incredible proposal for terraforming Mars.

  • 1993 K. S. Robinson Red Mars ii.80 Kim Stanley Robinson bibliography

    We must terraform only Mars, but ourselves.

  • 1993 J. Brunner Muddle Earth 114 John Brunner

    You’d have enough energy not just to terraform the nearly habitable planet, but make it over completely.

  • 1994 J. Barnes Mother of Storms (1995) iii. 385

    He has great fun thinking of a dozen ways to turn Jupiter into a midget sun and terraform it major moons, and working out which nations to settle where.

  • 2010 R. Reed History of Terraforming in Asimov’s Science Fiction July 94 page image Robert Reed bibliography

    Mercury, long considered too expensive to terraform, had been purchased and partially destroyed, doctored rock and iron fashioned into a fleet of enormous orbiting solar collectors.


Research requirements

antedating 1942

Earliest cite

Jack Williamson, "Collision Orbit"

Research History
Rick Hauptmann submitted a 1942 cite from Jack Williamson's "Collision Orbit". (Earliest cite in the OED: 1949)

Last modified 2021-01-02 16:07:11
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.