ATTENUATED • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Attenuated

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/ətˈɛnjuˌeɪtɪd/ Listen

verb

Attenuate v. t. (past & past part. attenuated; pres. part. attenuating)

To make thin or slender, as by mechanical or chemical action upon inanimate objects, or by the effects of starvation, disease, etc., upon living bodies.

To make thin or less consistent; to render less viscid or dense; to rarefy. Specifically: To subtilize, as the humors of the body, or to break them into finer parts.

To lessen the amount, force, or value of; to make less complex; to weaken. "To undersell our rivals... has led the manufacturer to... attenuate his processes, in the allotment of tasks, to an extreme point." "We may reject and reject till we attenuate history into sapless meagerness."

Attenuate v. i. To become thin, slender, or fine; to grow less; to lessen. "The attention attenuates as its sphere contracts."

adjective

Attenuated, Attenuate adj.

Made thin or slender.

Made thin or less viscid; rarefied.

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Etymology of 'Attenuated'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Attenuated" Quotes from Famous Books

... spot somewhat transverse, near the middle, beneath this a broadish band extends from the anal margin nearly to the outer side of wing, which is divided by a brown line, leaving an irregular squareish spot, attenuated towards the outer margin; on the margin are three differently-shaped dots beginning from the internal margin, and in one of the specimens are four slight lunules, growing fainter as they approach the outer margin. Beneath, upper wings with two transverse fulvescent orange bands, one near the ...

— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey

... dilated with terror. From around the curve of the road came the quick beat of hastening footsteps, the sobbing sound of panting breath, and between her and the sinking moon there passed an attenuated one-armed figure, with a pallid sharpened face, outlined for a moment on its brilliant disk, and dreadful starting eyes, and quivering open mouth. It disappeared in an instant among the shadows of the laurel, ...

— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly

... which gave it strength to stay? Whence came the reproductive power which was able to carry on the species under such terrible antagonism as the fact of death? If in the body, where was the common element between that attenuated invalid and my robust organization? If in the soul, between the suffering saint and the joyous man of the world, where again ...

— The Gates Between • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... much hair about Mr. Gray, counting mustache and all, that his face and body seemed drained and attenuated by the contribution of sustenance to keep the adornment flourishing in its brown abundance. For Gray was a tall, thin, bony-kneed man, with long flat feet like wedges of cheese. His eyes were hollow and melancholy, as if he bore ...

— Trail's End • George W. Ogden

... caballeros, and looked in. On the bed, which was drawn to the middle of the chamber to get the air through the narrow loopholed windows, with the gauze curtains falling square on all sides, lay Lucia. Her attenuated frame scarcely presented an uneven surface beneath the snowy sheet which covered it. Her superb hair was spread in great black masses on the pillow, and her pale marble face reposed there like an ivory picture in an ebony setting. ...

— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

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