silencing

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of silence.

   The government was silencing journalists who reported on the scandal.

   Silencing the engine, the mechanic listened for the faint rattle.

   Note

   Here the -ing form is still a verb, and it keeps the verb's grammar: it takes a direct object, as in silencing the engine or silencing critics. It can also carry any sense of silence, including its euphemistic use for murder. A quick test separates it from the noun for the act. If an object follows directly, it is the verb. If of follows, as in the silencing of critics, it is the noun.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act by which a person or thing is made silent or stopped from being heard.

   Like pressing the mute button on a person or a whole group at once.

   The silencing of dissenting voices drew sharp international condemnation.

   Her abrupt silencing during the debate angered her supporters.

   Similarsuppression

   Note

   A noun that counts: it takes a plural, and silencings names separate acts of suppression rather than a general state of quiet. In Charles Guignon and David R. Hiley's Richard Rorty (2003), silencings are interpretations that would obliterate another's voice, so the word reaches past literal hush to shutting a view out of a conversation. Keep it apart from the genetic sense, where what is silenced is a gene, not a speaker.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The prevention of a gene's expression, so that it does not produce its usual protein or product.

   Like muting one instrument in an orchestra so its part is never heard.

   Silencing of the oncogene halted tumor growth in the experiment.

   Researchers used RNA interference to achieve silencing of the target gene.

   Note

   Geneticists borrow the image of a voice cut off: the gene is still there, but it is no longer heard. Silencing works through DNA methylation, histone modification or RNA interference. These block transcription or translation without changing the gene's underlying sequence. The usual compound is gene silencing, and the verb is used the same way, as in silencing a target gene.

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