Definition of "copaiba" [co•pai•ba]

• A transparent, often yellowish, viscous oleoresin obtained from South American trees of the genus Copaifera in the pea family, used in certain varnishes and as a fixative in some perfumes. (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.

• "It still smells very much like gin and tonic, but with the addition of a few elements that make it a little more complex: lemon leaf, orris root CO2, litsea cubeba, lime and copaiba balsam."
• "Any out-patients 'room will furnish abundant instances of exact symmetry in the eruptions of eczema, lepra, and psoriasis; in the deformities of chronic rheumatism, the paralyses from lead; in the eruptions excited by iodide of potassium or copaiba."
• "If balsam of copaiba is made use of, the index of refraction of which is 1.50, a symmetrical field of about 24° will be obtained."