different between attenuate vs extend

English

Etymology

From Latin attenu?re, from attenu?t-, at- = ad-, ad- (“to”) + tenu?re (“to make thin”), tenuis (“thin”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??t?n.ju?.e?t/

Verb

attenuate (third-person singular simple present attenuates, present participle attenuating, simple past and past participle attenuated)

1. (transitive) To reduce in size, force, value, amount, or degree.
   • 1874, Thomas Hardy, Far From the Madding Crowd, ch. 40:

     A manor-house clock from the far depths of shadow struck the hour, one, in a small, attenuated tone.

2. (transitive) To make thinner, as by physically reshaping, starving, or decaying.
   • 1899, Stephen Crane, His New Mittens, ch. 4:

     Clumps of attenuated turkeys were suspended here and there.

   • 1906, E. Phillips Oppenheim, The Malefactor, ch. 1:

     Lovell, wan and hollow-eyed, his arm in a sling, his once burly frame gaunt and attenuated with disease, nodded.

3. (intransitive) To become thin or fine; to grow less.
4. (transitive) To weaken.
   • 1851, Sir Francis Palgrave, The History of Normandy and of England, ch. IV:

     We may reject and reject till we attenuate history into sapless meagreness.

5. (transitive) To rarefy.
   • 1901, H. G. Wells, The First Men in the Moon, ch. 23:

     "It speedily became apparent that the entire strangeness of our circumstances and surroundings—great loss of weight, attenuated but highly oxygenated air, consequent exaggeration of the results of muscular effort, rapid development of weird plants from obscure spores, lurid sky—was exciting my companion unduly."

6. (transitive, medicine) To reduce the virulence of a bacterium or virus.
7. (transitive, electronics) To reduce the amplitude of an electrical, radio, or optical signal.
8. (brewing) (of a beer) To become less dense as a result of the conversion of sugar to alcohol.

Antonyms

• (electronics): amplify

Derived terms

• attenuation
• attenuable
• attenuator
• attenuative

Related terms

Translations

Adjective

attenuate (comparative more attenuate, superlative most attenuate)

1. (botany, of leaves) Gradually tapering into a petiole-like extension toward the base.

Translations

Italian

Verb

attenuate

1. second-person plural present indicative of attenuare
2. second-person plural imperative of attenuare
3. feminine plural of attenuato

Latin

Verb

attenu?te

1. second-person plural present active imperative of attenu?

English

Etymology

From Middle English extenden, from Anglo-Norman extendre, estendre, from Latin extend? (“I stretch out”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?k?st?nd/
• Rhymes: -?nd
• Hyphenation: ex?tend

Verb

extend (third-person singular simple present extends, present participle extending, simple past and past participle extended)

1. (intransitive) To increase in extent.
2. (intransitive) To possess a certain extent; to cover an amount of space.

   The desert extended for miles in all directions.

3. (transitive) To cause to increase in extent.
4. (transitive) To cause to last for a longer period of time.
5. (transitive) To straighten (a limb).
6. (transitive) To bestow; to offer; to impart; to apply.

   to extend sympathy to the suffering

   to extend credit to a valued customer

7. To increase in quantity by weakening or adulterating additions.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of G. P. Burnham to this entry?)

   • 1897, Alonzo Lewis, James Robinson Newhall, History of Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts (page 155)

     […] the exalted morality of those virtuous brethren in the trade who, with consciences as weak as their own "extended" liquors, sought to convince him that to reduce the drink was a mercy to the poor deluded toper.

8. (Britain, law) To value, as lands taken by a writ of extent in satisfaction of a debt; to assign by writ of extent.
9. (object-oriented programming) Of a class: to be an extension or subtype of, or to be based on, a prototype or a more abstract class.

   Synonym: inherit

10. (intransitive, US, military) To reenlist for a further period.
    • 1993, The Leatherneck (volume 76, page xxxvi)

      Two years later, back to amtracs, this time at Camp Schwab, Okinawa, and I liked it so much I extended.

Synonyms

• enlarge
• expand
• increase
• lengthen
• stretch
• widen

Related terms

Translations

Anagrams

• dentex