From Middle French dominant.

• (RP) IPA: /ˈdɒmɪnənt/
• (America) IPA: /ˈdɑmənənt/

dominant (plural dominants)

1. (music) The fifth major tone of a musical scale (five major steps above the note in question); thus G is the dominant of C, A of D, and so on.
2. (music) The triad built on the dominant tone.
3. (genetics) Of an allele, that a heterozygote for the allele has the same phenotype as the homozygote.
   • 1930, R. A. Fisher, J. H. Bennett, The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection, page 50:

     Finally, if we suppose provisionally that the mutant genes are dominant just as often as they are recessive, selection will be far more severe in eliminating the disadvantageous dominants than in eliminating the disadvantageous recessives.

4. A species or organism that is dominant.
   • 1966, John R. Bassett, Thinning loblolly pine from above and below, New Orleans, La: Southern Forest Experiment Station:

     Landowners cannot afford to cut submerchantable trees, yet many hesitate to cut merchantable dominants and codominants at the risk of downgrading the residual stand.

5. (BDSM) The dominating partner in sadomasochistic sexual activity.

   Hyponym: dominatrix

   • 2011, Jayne Rylon, Mistress's Master, page 65:

     His story was a fable you told dominants in training to stress the importance of comprehending the depths of your submissive's needs.

• dominator

• Portuguese: dominante
• Russian: домина́нта

dominant

1. Ruling; governing; prevailing

   The dominant party controlled the government.

   • 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 12, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC ↗:

     The member of a dominant race is, in his dealings with the subject race, seldom indeed fraudulent, […] but imperious, insolent, and cruel.

2. Predominant, common, prevalent, of greatest importance.

   The dominant plants of the Carboniferous were lycopods and early conifers.

   • 2009, H. Stephen Stoker, General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry, page 10:

     All other elements are mere "impurities" when their abundances are compared with those of these two dominant elements.

3. (, of a body part) Preferred and used with greater dexterity than the other, as the right hand of a right-handed person or the left hand of a left-handed one.
4. (medicine) Designating the follicle which will survive atresia and permit ovulation.
5. (music) Being the dominant

   Dominant seventh

• (ruling, governing) imposing
• (predominant, common) prevalent

• (antonym(s) of “ruling”): obedient, submissive (one who obeys); defiant, rebellious (one who defys)

• French: dominant
• German: dominant
• Italian: dominante
• Portuguese: dominante
• Russian: преоблада́ющий

• French: dominant
• Italian: dominante, predominante, più diffuso
• Portuguese: dominante
• Russian: преоблада́ющий
• Spanish: dominante, imperante