noun
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a shop selling medicines, cosmetics, etc
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a qualified dispenser of prescribed medicines
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a person studying, trained in, or engaged in chemistry
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an obsolete word for alchemist
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of chemist
First recorded in 1555–65; from Greek chēm(ía) (also chēmeía, chymeía ) “art of alloying metals; alchemy” + -ist; replacing chymist, from Medieval Latin alchimista; see alchemist ( def. )
Explanation
A scientist who studies the elements that make up all matter is a chemist. If you enjoy doing experiments that involve mixing substances in test tubes, you'd probably love being a chemist. Chemists practice the science of chemistry, which examines the properties that make up everything in the universe. These working scientists examine the tiniest particles of substances, the atoms and molecules that form the earth, the oceans, and even you, yourself. Chemists also study how elements interact with each other and form new substances; we have chemists to thank for inventing penicillin, plastic, and artificial sweeteners, among many other things.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The planet faced a cataclysmic agricultural crisis until the German chemist Fritz Haber discovered a process for cheaply producing nitrogen fertilizer.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 26, 2026
Anand, who accompanied them, led them to their first stop - a chemist because Anita had developed a migraine headache and wanted to buy a painkiller.
From BBC ● Jun. 3, 2026
"Basically, it needs to be safe forever," noted Lauri Parviainen, a Posiva chemist who showed reporters around the facilities.
From Barron's ● Jun. 1, 2026
In November 2019, soil engineer Tim Neiligan, a former FBI chemist, began researching how bodies decompose in soil.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 9, 2026
Yet somehow Linus, unquestionably the world’s most astute chemist, had come to the opposite conclusion.
From "Double Helix" by James D. Watson
Now, chemists at Northwestern University have solved that long standing mystery.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 6, 2026
So there was an overnight operation of chemists and first responders sent in to try to get that done, which was attempted even though it put them “in harm’s way,” Covey said.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 23, 2026
Past directors have included physicists, chemists and computer scientists.
From Salon ● May 7, 2026
"When making tools for chemists, the user interface matters a lot, and previous tools relied on cumbersome filters and rules," says Andres M Bran, the first author of the Synthegy paper published in Matter.
From Science Daily ● May 5, 2026
At first Lewis’s chemists were mystified by the sudden degradation in their experimental results, but they eventually traced the trouble to neutron interference.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
