• vt. 孵化；培養(yǎng)；溫育；逐漸發(fā)展
• vi. 孵化；醞釀
• n. 孵育物

in-,進入，使，在上面，-cub,躺，詞源同cubicle,succumb.即躺在上面，引申詞義孵化，培養(yǎng)。

incubate

incubate: [18] Latin incubāre, the source of English incubate, meant literally ‘lie down on’. It was based on the verb cubāre ‘lie’, which also produced English concubine and cubicle. The notion of ‘lying on eggs to hatch them’ seems later to have fed back into the simple verb cubāre, which in this sense gave English couvade ‘male mimicking of child-bearing’ [19] (an anthropological term borrowed from French) and covey [14].

Another English descendant of incubāre is incubus ‘male demon that has sex with a sleeping woman’ [14], literally ‘one who lies down on another’ (its counterpart is the succubus ‘female demon that has sex with a sleeping man’ [16], literally ‘one who lies down under another’). The nasalized version of the stem of Latin cubāre gave English incumbent [16] (which etymologically means ‘resting upon as a duty’) and recumbent [17].
=> cubicle, concubine, covey, incubus, incumbent, recumbent, succubus, succumb

incubate (v.)

1640s, "to brood upon, watch jealously" (which also was a figurative sense of Latin incubare); 1721 as "to sit on eggs to hatch them," from Latin incubatus, past participle of incubare "to lie in or upon" (see incubation). Related: Incubated; incubating.

1. The birds returned to their nests and continued to incubate the eggs.

鳥兒回到巢里繼續(xù)孵卵。

來自柯林斯例句

2. The time needed for the eggs to incubate is nine or ten days.

蛋孵化需要的時間是九到十天.

來自《簡明英漢詞典》

3. The virus can incubate for up to ten days after the initial infection.

病毒在初次感染以后可以潛伏長達10天。

來自辭典例句

4. Incubate all the containers containing medium for not more than 5 days.

培養(yǎng)所有含有培養(yǎng)基的容器,培養(yǎng)時間不超過5天.

來自互聯(lián)網(wǎng)

5. Incubate the inoculated media for not less than 14 days.

將接種后的培養(yǎng)基培養(yǎng)不少于14天.

來自互聯(lián)網(wǎng)