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1. Deprive of oxygen and prevent from breathing
   "Othello asphyxiated Desdemona with a pillow";
   - smother, suffocate
    
2. Impair the respiration of or obstruct the air passage of
   "The foul air was slowly asphyxiating the children";
   - suffocate, stifle, choke
    
3. Be asphyxiated; die from lack of oxygen
   "The child asphyxiated under the pillow";
   - suffocate, stifle

Derived forms: asphyxiated, asphyxiates, asphyxiating

Type of: block, buy the farm [N. Amer, informal], cash in [informal], cash in one's chips [informal], choke, close up, conk [informal], cop it [Brit, informal], croak [informal], decease [archaic], die, drop dead, exit, expire, flatline [informal], give-up the ghost [informal], go, impede, jam, kick the bucket [informal], kill, obstruct, obturate, occlude, pass, pass away, perish, pop off [informal], pop one's clogs [informal], snuff it [informal]

Encyclopedia: Asphyxiate