subserve
Americanverb (used with object)
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subserves,
present (3rd person singular)
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subserved,
past participle, past
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subserving
present participle
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to be useful or instrumental in promoting (a purpose, action, etc.).
Light exercise subserves digestion.
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Obsolete. to serve as a subordinate.
verb
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to be helpful or useful to
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obsolete to be subordinate to
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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subservesimple
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subservessimple
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have subservedperfect
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has subservedperfect
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am subservingprogressive
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are subservingprogressive
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is subservingprogressive
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have been subservingperfect progressive
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has been subservingperfect progressive
Past
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subservedsimple
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had subservedperfect
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was subservingprogressive
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were subservingprogressive
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had been subservingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of subserve
1610–20; < Latin subservīre, equivalent to sub- sub- + servīre to serve
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:
These auditory and reward network pathways likely subserve the mind’s ability to form predictions and expectations during music listening.
From Scientific American ● Sep. 18, 2021
Resting-state fMRI has shown that brain networks that subserve motor and even cognitive functions like language, memory and emotion are continuously and dynamically active in the resting brain.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 7, 2017
In a paper published in The Lancet in February 1916, he posited a “physical or chemical change and a break in the links of the chain of neurons which subserve a particular function.”
From New York Times ● Jun. 10, 2016
Some years before, Artist Robinson had concluded that the only excuse for painting was to subserve architecture and had applied himself to that problem.
From Time Magazine Archive
Because your father has trained Orlean to obey and subserve to his will, he has done something to her, and she has become a demon instead of a weakling.
From The Homesteader A Novel by Oscar Micheaux
If translated to humans, these findings have important implications for understanding how the hippocampus subserves various cognitive functions that rely on it, such as episodic memory, navigation and imagination.
From Scientific American ● Jun. 3, 2013
It simply subserves, extends, illuminates and liberates Shakespeare's poem.
From Time Magazine Archive
He thought that vowels can be as skilfully combined and interchanged as differing notes of music, and that monotony should only be allowed when it subserves some special purpose.
From Life of John Keats by William Michael Rossetti
It may be laid down as a general rule that the policy which best subserves the interests of the patrons of a road is always the best policy for its owners.
From The Railroad Question A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and remedies for their abuses by William Larrabee
It is no longer a restless agent, without definite aim; it has a large field of exertion assigned to it, and it subserves those social interests which it would naturally trouble.
From The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin by John Henry Newman
If any thing new is furnished that shall also prove interesting, the end will be subserved.
From Bugle Blasts Read before the Ohio Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States by William E. Crane
In brief, unless some special purpose is subserved thereby, an audience should not long be left in the dark as to the form in which the dramatist thinks he has cast his play.
From Dramatic Technique by George Pierce Baker
WELFARE, public, subserved by passage of Freedmen's Bureau Bill, 149.
From History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States by William Horatio Barnes
It is the same which is subserved by the quivering of the leaves of trees.
From Flower, Fruit, and Thorn Pieces; or, the Wedded Life, Death, and Marriage of Firmian Stanislaus Siebenkaes, Parish Advocate in the Burgh of Kuhschnappel. by Jean Paul
Upon the whole, it must be insisted that religious belief has subserved a large purpose in the economy of human progress.
From History of Human Society by Frank W. (Frank Wilson) Blackmar
Considering the hugging behavior and similar part of the gene, the authors say there’s evidence that “the neural mechanisms subserving social behaviors exist in O. bimaculoides.”
From Washington Post ● Sep. 20, 2018
The first germs of science were very simple, existing in connection with Art, and subserving the purposes of priestcraft.
From The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 Devoted To Literature And National Policy by Various
If it should prove otherwise, Congress can at any time amend those laws in such manner as, while subserving the public welfare, not to jeopard the rights, interests, and liberties of the people.
From A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents Volume 6, part 2: Andrew Johnson by James D. (James Daniel) Richardson
So, doubtless, when beneath thy potence swerving, 'Tis that thou lead'st us by a path unknown, Our seeming deviations all subserving The perfect orbit round the central throne.
From An Anthology of Australian Verse by Bertram Stevens
Its repeated occurrence in Mr. Arnold's pages is but another instance of poetic feeling subserving the ends of criticism.
From Views and Reviews by Henry James
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.
