From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishcatalysisca‧tal‧y‧sis /kəˈtælɪsɪs/ noun [uncountable] technical the process of making a chemical reaction quicker by adding a catalyst
Examples from the Corpus
catalysis• X-ray diffraction and spectroscopic techniques continue to provide important clues, leading towards an understanding of the remarkable specificity of enzymatic catalysis.• Enzymatic catalysis involves the breaking and making of different chemical bonds.• Thus, residue Cys 177 is identified as essential for catalysis.• However, nobody had made the conclusive step of considering the consequences of this, namely the chain of muon catalysis reactions.• Linkage of the addition reaction to the molecular mechanism of catalysis therefore depends on demonstration of sequence specificity.Origin catalysis (1600-1700) Greek katalysis, from katalyein “to become liquid”, from kata- ( → CATACLYSM) + lyein “to let go, become liquid” 