adulterant
/ə'dʌltərənt/
Definition
Noun:
- A substance that lessens the purity or effectiveness of another substance: An "adulterant" is a material added to a product, often secretly, to increase its quantity or reduce its cost, thereby making it impure, weaker, or less effective.
Adjective:
- Making impure or corrupt by adding extraneous materials: Used to describe a substance or agent that has the effect of contaminating or debasing the purity of something else.
Examples of Usage
Noun:
- The laboratory test revealed several dangerous adulterants in the dietary supplement.
- Milk was historically a common target for adulterants like water or chalk.
Adjective:
- The adulterant substance was mixed with the flour to increase its weight.
- They were accused of using an adulterant chemical in the fuel.
Advanced Usage
"Act as an adulterant": To function as a substance that contaminates.
- This cheap oil acts as an adulterant, degrading the quality of the entire batch.
"Deliberate adulterant": A contaminant added intentionally.
- The investigation focused on finding the deliberate adulterant in the pharmaceutical supply chain.
Variants and Related Words
- Adulterate (verb): To make something impure or weaker by adding another substance.
- It is illegal to adulterate food products.
- Adulteration (noun): The process or act of adulterating.
- The adulteration of spices is a serious problem in some markets.
- Adulterator (noun): A person or thing that adulterates.
- The machine was identified as the primary adulterator in the factory.
Synonyms
- Contaminant: Something that makes a substance impure by contact or mixture.
- Impurity: An element that makes something less pure.
- Diluent: A substance used to dilute another (can be neutral or negative in connotation).
- Filler: An inexpensive substance used to add bulk (often carries a negative implication when undisclosed).
Related Phrases
- Adulterant detection: The process of finding contaminants in a product.
- Advances in adulterant detection have improved food safety.
- Free from adulterants: A claim of purity.
- This certificate guarantees the honey is free from adulterants.
Related Idioms
- To be laced with an adulterant: To have a harmful or cheap substance added to it.
- The cocaine was found to be laced with a dangerous adulterant.
- The adulterant of choice: The most commonly used substance for adulterating a particular product.
- For expensive saffron, turmeric is often the adulterant of choice.
Adjective
-
making impure or corrupt by adding extraneous materials
-
the adulterating effect of extraneous materials
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Noun
-
any substance that lessens the purity or effectiveness of a substance
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it is necessary to remove the adulterants before use
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