invert

Etymology 1

From Middle French invertir.

verb

1. (transitive) To turn (something) upside down or inside out; to place in a contrary order or direction.
   to invert a cup, the order of words, rules of justice, etc.
2. (transitive, music) To move (the root note of a chord) up or down an octave, resulting in a change in pitch.
3. (chemistry, intransitive) To undergo inversion, as sugar.
4. To divert; to convert to a wrong use.
5. (anatomy) To turn (the foot) inwards.

noun

1. (obsolete, psychology) A homosexual, in terms of the sexual inversion theory.
   We can seldom, therefore, congratulate ourselves on the success of any "cure" of inversion. The success is unlikely to be either permanent or complete, in the case of a decided invert; and in the most successful cases we have simply put into the invert's hands a power of reproduction which it is undesirable he should possess. 1897, W. Havelock Ellis, Sexual Inversion, page 202
2. (architecture) An inverted arch (as in a sewer).
3. The base of a tunnel on which the road or railway may be laid and used when construction is through unstable ground. It may be flat or form a continuous curve with the tunnel arch.
4. (civil engineering) The lowest point inside a pipe at a certain point.
5. (civil engineering) An elevation of a pipe at a certain point along the pipe.
6. A skateboarding trick where the skater grabs the board and plants a hand on the coping so as to balance upside-down on the lip of a ramp.

adj

1. (chemistry) Subjected to the process of inversion; inverted; converted.
   invert sugar

Etymology 2

noun

1. (zoology, informal) An invertebrate.