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Showing results for devitalize. Search instead for Devitalized.
Synonyms

devitalize

American  
[dee-vahyt-l-ahyz] / diˈvaɪt lˌaɪz /
especially British, devitalise

verb (used with object)

devitalized, devitalizing
  1. to deprive of vitality or vital properties; make lifeless; weaken.


devitalize British  
/ diːˈvaɪtəˌlaɪz /

verb

  1. (tr) to lower or destroy the vitality of; make weak or lifeless

    the war devitalized the economy

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Etymology

Origin of devitalize

First recorded in 1840–50; de- + vitalize

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:

This can devitalize the plant to the point of it starting to die back.

From Seattle Times Feb. 22, 2023

So this latter phenomenon physicians use to devitalize cancerous growths-and on the ovaries to bring on artificial menopause.

From Time Magazine Archive

Its effect must have also been to devitalize the oxygen and nitrogen of the atmosphere.

From A Republic Without a President and Other Stories by Herbert D. (Herbert Dickinson) Ward

His opinions, whatever they are, do not devitalize his fiction.

From The Critical Game by John Albert Macy

These shoots are useless, devitalize the vine, and hinder vineyard operations.

From Manual of American Grape-Growing by U. P. Hedrick

She was a tennis-playing nutritionist with a master's in biochemistry who was a critic of processed, "devitalized" foods and advocated for vitamin supplements.

From Salon Sep. 17, 2023

Surgeons working on the case at UMC noted in the Sunday briefing that they had found only minimal amounts of "devitalized" brain matter and had already removed it.

From Scientific American Jan. 11, 2011

Giffords, a 40-year-old Democratic lawmaker, did not have severe bleeding in the brain nor large sections of devitalized brain tissue, Lemole said.

From Reuters Jan. 9, 2011

Lemole said that the amount of "devitalized" brain tissue that they removed was small.

From Washington Post Jan. 9, 2011

In some cases young trees were killed out-right as were occasional older trees that had become devitalized in some way.

From Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Thirty-Seventh Annual Report Wooster, Ohio, September 3, 4, 5, 1946 by Northern Nut Growers Association

After painting for several years, he found himself distressed by "the devitalizing isolation of the studio."

From Time Magazine Archive

In the process thousands of hours of vital time were lost in conferences, argument and devitalizing hiatuses while heels and ardor cooled.

From Time Magazine Archive

In depicting the influences which have led and are daily leading with augmented force to the devitalizing of the doctrine of immortality, I may with propriety confine myself to those which are themselves strictly religious.

From The Religious Sentiment Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and Philosophy of Religion by Daniel Garrison Brinton

He showed her the wrong invalidism thoughts, the unhappy, depressing, devitalizing attitude toward death.

From Our Nervous Friends — Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness by Robert S. Carroll

In fact, the war’s profoundly devitalizing effects upon the general population can hardly be overestimated.

From The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy by Lothrop Stoddard

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