zero sound, n.

zero-sound
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zero-sound_n%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
Revised 2018

# zero soundnoun

## Factsheet

### What does the noun zero sound mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the noun zero sound. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

### How common is the noun zero sound?

About 0.01occurrences per million words in modern written English

1950 | 0.015
1960 | 0.014
1970 | 0.012
1980 | 0.011
1990 | 0.012
2000 | 0.0085
2010 | 0.0069

### Where does the noun zero sound come from?

Earliest known use

1950s

The earliest known use of the noun zero sound is in the 1950s.

OED's earliest evidence for zero sound is from 1957.

### Nearby entries

1. zero-order, adj. 1919–
2. zero plane, n. 1842–
3. zero point, n. 1789–
4. zero-point energy, n. 1913–
5. zero population growth, n. 1955–
6. zero post, n. 1908–
7. zero-power, adj. 1950–
8. zero-rate, v. 1972–
9. zero-rated, adj. 1972–
10. zero rating, n. 1971–
11. zero sound, n.1957–
12. zero-sum, adj. 1944–
13. zeroth, adj. 1850–
14. zero tillage, n. 1963–
15. zero tolerance, n. 1940–
16. zerovalent, adj. 1906–
17. zero waste, adj. & n. 1974–
18. zero-zero, adj. & n. 1930–
19. zerumbet, n. 1640–
20. zest, n.¹ 1674–
21. zest, n.² 1706

## Etymology

After Russian nulevoj zvuk (L. D. Landau 1957, in Žurnal èksper. i teoret. fiziki vol. 32 59).

## Meaning & use

1. 1957–
   The propagation of waves through a Fermi liquid, caused by deformation of the Fermi surface rather than collisions between particles; see sound n.3 1d.
   1. 1957

      > It is shown..that in a Fermi liquid at absolute zero other waves can be propagated; these differ in nature from ordinary sound, and we shall call them waves of ‘zero sound’.

      translation of L. D. Landau in Soviet Physics: JETP vol. 5 102/1
   2. 1999

      > These bosonic oscillative modes are known as different harmonics of the zero sound.

      Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences U.S.A. vol. 96 6042/2
   3. 2015

      > Whereas conventional sound travels at a speed below the Fermi velocity, zero sound is ‘supersonic’, traveling at speeds in excess of the Fermi velocity.

      P. Coleman, Introd. Many-body Physics vi.150

## Frequency

zero sound typically occurs about 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.

zero sound is in frequency band 3, which contains words occurring between 0.01 and 0.1 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zero sound, n., 1950–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1950 | 0.015
1960 | 0.014
1970 | 0.012
1980 | 0.011
1990 | 0.012
2000 | 0.0085
2010 | 0.0069

Originally published as part of the entry for zero, n. & adj.

zero, n. & adj. was revised in June 2018.