chaperone

See chaperon.

• Audio (UK):

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• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈʃæ.pəˌɹoʊn/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈʃæ.pəˌɹəʊn/

chaperone (plural chaperones)

1. An older person who accompanies other younger people to ensure the propriety of their behaviour, often an older woman accompanying a young woman.
2. (biochemistry) A protein that assists the non-covalent folding/unfolding and the assembly/disassembly of other macromolecular structures, but does not occur in these structures when the latter are performing their normal biological functions.
3. (UK, business) An employee sent by a British company to the European Union to work with a client there, to circumvent restrictions imposed after Brexit.

chaperone (third-person singular simple present chaperones, present participle chaperoning, simple past and past participle chaperoned)

1. To act as a chaperone.
   • 1912 (date written), [George] Bernard Shaw, “Pygmalion”, in Androcles and the Lion, Overruled, Pygmalion, London: Constable and Company, published 1916, →OCLC, Act V, page 183:

     They played you off very cunning, Eliza. If it had been only one of them, you could have nailed him. But you see, there was two; and one of them chaperoned the other, as you might say.

   • 2006 April 17, The New Yorker, page 27:

     'Purcell had volunteered to chaperone a delegation of female students'

   • 2021 June 30, Tim Dunn, “How we made... Secrets of the London Underground”, in RAIL, number 934, pages 48–49:

     TfL has more than enough to be getting on with each day without having to chaperone TV crews.

2. (UK, business) To work as a chaperone.

• Chaperone (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

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