characterized

especially British, char·ac·ter·ised

[kar-ik-tuh-rahyzd]

adjective

1. having been described or distinguished.

   Further identification is possible by comparing the unknown organism with a characterized organism.

verb

1. the simple past tense and past participle of characterize.

Other Word Forms

• noncharacterized adjective
• uncharacterized adjective
• well-characterized adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of characterized¹

characterize ( def. ) + -ed ² ( def. )

Example Sentences

"It appears that when each concept retained in memory is characterized in terms of seven features -- as opposed to, say, five or eight -- the number of distinct objects held in memory is maximized."

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Dehn and others have characterized that reading of the code as semantic and divorced from its legal context.

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Al-Astal refused being characterized as a traitor, saying family members, including his sister, were killed by Israeli bombs.

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They had previously been characterized as entirely herbivorous, like gorillas, Goodall observed them hunting, killing and eating small mammals such as bush pigs and colobus monkeys, by any standard a complicated collaborative enterprise.

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But Goodall overcame her critics and produced work that Gould later characterized as “one of the Western world’s great scientific achievements.”

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Related Words

• defined 
• described www.thesaurus.com
• expressed www.thesaurus.com
• pictured www.thesaurus.com