sterilize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to destroy microorganisms in or on, usually by bringing to a high temperature with steam, dry heat, or boiling liquid.
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to destroy the ability of (a person or animal) to reproduce by removing the sexual organs or inhibiting their functions.
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to make (land) barren or unproductive.
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Informal. to delete or remove anything comprising or damaging from.
to sterilize a government document before releasing it to the press.
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Informal. to isolate or completely protect from unwanted, unauthorized, or unwholesome activities, attitudes, influences, etc..
You can't sterilize children against violence.
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of sterilize
Explanation
When you sterilize something, you make it completely clean and free from any contaminant. It's important to sterilize tools, hands, and furniture in hospitals so germs don't get spread between patients. People who make their own jam and pickles need to sterilize the jars first, and when you feed a tiny baby it's important to sterilize the bottles. Whenever you need to make sure something is as clean as possible, you should sterilize it. The earliest meaning of sterilize is still in use, too: to "make infertile," or to make it impossible for an organism to reproduce or have a baby.
Vocabulary lists containing sterilize
Everything, Everything
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Z for Zachariah
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This Week In Words: Current Events Vocab for January 16–22, 2021
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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.
We press that mash, sterilize it by heating, bottle it and ship it out.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 15, 2026
Scientists in the 1950s discovered a technique that uses radiation to sterilize male parasitic flies.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 17, 2025
The easiest way to kill off the tardigrades, the researchers argue, would be to sterilize the entire planet, adding 5.6 × 1026 J of energy to make the oceans boil off.
From Salon • Feb. 25, 2025
We cannot even think much about how to sterilize water before drinking it, because there is no cooking gas and no wood to light a fire.
From Slate • Oct. 22, 2024
By 1930, when Louie was entering his teens, California was enraptured with eugenics, and would ultimately sterilize some twenty thousand people.
From "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand
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.
