attenuation

[uh-ten-yoo-ey-shuhn]

noun

1. the act of attenuating or the state of being attenuated.

2. the process by which a virus, bacterium, etc., changes under laboratory conditions to become harmless or less virulent.

3. Physics.,  a decrease in a property, as energy, per unit area of a wave or a beam of particles, occurring as the distance from the source increases as a result of absorption, scattering, spreading in three dimensions, etc.

Other Word Forms

• subattenuation noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of attenuation¹

1585–95; (< Middle French ) < Latin attenuātiōn- (stem of attenuātiō ). See attenuate, -ion

Example Sentences

There are two main strategies: First is “attenuation” of the variety of environment, such that “that the system produces fewer possible states of the world to be anticipated or managed.”

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Even sisters who share a close bond have usually passed through periods of attenuation.

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After all, tidal flats are important foraging areas for birds and contribute to wave attenuation.

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They investigated the carbon fluxes and their attenuation off the coast of Peru in an area with a millennia-old permanent oxygen minimum zone.

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"We experimentally determined the seismic wave attenuation characteristics, parameters for ascertaining the softness of the lithosphere and asthenosphere, under high temperature and pressure using our short-period oscillation generation technology," explains Prof. Yoshino.

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