Ask Difference

Sediment vs. Decantation — What's the Difference?

Difference Between Sediment and Decantation

ADVERTISEMENT

Definitions

Sediment

Sediment is a naturally occurring material that is broken down by processes of weathering and erosion, and is subsequently transported by the action of wind, water, or ice or by the force of gravity acting on the particles. For example, sand and silt can be carried in suspension in river water and on reaching the sea bed deposited by sedimentation; if buried, they may eventually become sandstone and siltstone (sedimentary rocks) through lithification.

Decantation

Decantation is a process for the separation of mixtures of immiscible liquids or of a liquid and a solid mixture such as a suspension. The layer closer to the top of the container—the less dense of the two liquids, or the liquid from which the precipitate or sediment has settled out—is poured off, leaving the other component or the more dense liquid of the mixture behind.

Sediment

Matter that settles to the bottom of a liquid; dregs
The ice freezes the wine and sediment at the base of the cork

Decantation

To pour off (wine, for example) without disturbing the sediment.

Sediment

Settle as sediment
The erythrocytes were allowed to sediment within the syringe
ADVERTISEMENT

Decantation

To pour (a liquid) from one container into another.

Sediment

Material that settles to the bottom of a liquid; lees.

Decantation

To aerate (a wine) by pouring it into a spacious vessel and leaving it exposed to the air for a period of time
Decanted the wine for twenty minutes before serving.

Sediment

Solid fragments of inorganic or organic material that come from the weathering of rock and are carried and deposited by wind, water, or ice.

Decantation

The act of decanting the supernatant liquid from a solid sediment
ADVERTISEMENT

Sediment

A collection of small particles, particularly dirt, that precipitates from a river or other body of water.
The Nile delta is composed of sediment that was washed down and deposited at the mouth of the river.

Decantation

The act of pouring off a clear liquor gently from its lees or sediment, or from one vessel into another.

Sediment

(transitive) To deposit material as a sediment.

Sediment

(intransitive) To be deposited as a sediment.

Sediment

The matter which subsides to the bottom, from water or any other liquid; settlings; lees; dregs.

Sediment

The material of which sedimentary rocks are formed.

Sediment

Matter deposited by some natural process

Sediment

Deposit as a sediment

Sediment

Settle as sediment

Popular Comparisons

Featured Comparisons

Trending Comparisons

New Phrases