saturate
pronunciation
How to pronounce saturate in British English:
UK [ˈsætʃəreɪt]
How to pronounce saturate in American English:
US [ˈsætʃəreɪt]
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- Verb:
- cause (a chemical compound, vapour, solution, magnetic material, etc.) to unite with the greatest possible amount of another substance
- infuse or fill completely
Word Origin
- saturate
- saturate: [16] Latin satur meant ‘full’, and in particular ‘full of food, full up’ (it was a relative of satis ‘enough’, source of English satiate and satisfy). From it was formed a verb saturāre ‘fill, glut, surfeit’, whose past participle has given English saturate. At first this was used as a synonym of satisfy or satiate (‘so to saturate their insatiable hunger’, Thomas Bell, Survey of Popery 1596), and the modern sense ‘soak’ did not emerge fully until the mid 18th century.=> sad, sated, satisfy
- saturate (v.)
- 1530s, "to satisfy, satiate," from Latin saturatus, past participle of saturare "to fill full, sate, drench," from satur "sated, full," from PIE root *sa- "to satisfy" (see sad). Meaning "soak thoroughly" first recorded 1756. Marketing sense first recorded 1958. Related: Saturated; saturating.
Example
- 1. To use , shake the bottle and saturate a cotton pad with the lotion .
- 2. Heavy rains can saturate hillsides , leading to devastating mudslides .
- 3. Saturate the bandage with disinfectant .
- 4. Saturate the moss with water before planting the bulbs in it .
- 5. Police were ordered to saturate the area .