Definition of "polynya" [polynya]

• An area of open water surrounded by sea ice. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "A polynya is a large area of open water surrounded by sea ice that is found in the same region year after year."
• "Third: if the polynya was a freak occurence then you wouldn’t expect to see the Beaufort frozen over on July 25th every year. 2006 was just an accident."
• "The goal was to map water conditions in the Ross Sea "polynya," a region of open water surrounded by sea ice, where the plankton blooms every Antarctic summer."