Avkyla

Avkyla is a Swedish verb meaning to lower the temperature of something or to cool it down. The form is built from the prefix av-, indicating removal, and kyla, to cool. The term is widely used in everyday language as well as in technical contexts such as cooking, food safety, electronics cooling, and meteorology.

In cooking and food safety, avkyla describes cooling hot foods quickly to slow or prevent the growth of bacteria. Common guidance specifies avkylning till below a specified temperature (often around 4 °C) before storage. Practical examples include placing a hot soup in a cold water bath or dividing large portions to speed cooling.

In engineering and electronics, avkyla refers to practices and systems designed to reduce device temperatures, such as heat sinks, air or liquid cooling, and refrigeration cycles used in machinery or data centers.

In meteorology, avkyla can describe the cooling of air after a heat event, typically occurring through processes such as radiative cooling, air advection, or frontal passage.

Inflection and related terms: the present tense is avkylar, the past tense avkylde, and the supine avkylt. The related noun forms include avkylning (the act of cooling) and nedkylning (the cooling down process). Avkyla is often contrasted with kyla (to cool) and is used in formal as well as informal registers.