terraform v.

to transform (a planet or environment) 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.

  • 1981 T. Pratchett Strata 11 page image Terry Pratchett bibliography

    We build worlds, we don’t just terraform planets. Robots could do that. We build places where the imagination of human beings can find an anchor.

  • 1988 A. M. Steele Live from the Mars Hotel in Asimov’s Science Fiction mid-December 108 page image Allen Steele bibliography

    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.

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

    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 the Oort (1993) 69 Frederik Pohl bibliography

    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 J. Brunner Muddle Earth 114 John Brunner bibliography

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

  • 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".
Clive Shergold submitted a 1981 cite from Terry Pratchett.

Last modified 2023-08-21 13:23:28
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.