Lexic.us

Definition of Reduce

1. Verb. Cut down on; make a reduction in. "They will reduce the duet"; "The employer wants to cut back health benefits"

2. Verb. Make less complex. "Reduce a problem to a single question"

3. Verb. Bring to humbler or weaker state or condition. "He reduced the population to slavery"

4. Verb. Simplify the form of a mathematical equation of expression by substituting one term for another.

5. Verb. Lower in grade or rank or force somebody into an undignified situation. "She reduced her niece to a servant"

6. Verb. Be the essential element. "The proposal boils down to a compromise"

7. Verb. Reduce in size; reduce physically. "Can you shrink this image?"

8. Verb. Lessen and make more modest. "Reduce one's standard of living"

9. Verb. Make smaller. "Reduce an image"

10. Verb. To remove oxygen from a compound, or cause to react with hydrogen or form a hydride, or to undergo an increase in the number of electrons.

11. Verb. Narrow or limit. "Reduce the influx of foreigners"

12. Verb. Put down by force or intimidation. "The rich landowners subjugated the peasants working the land"

13. Verb. Undergo meiosis. "The cells reduce"

14. Verb. Reposition (a broken bone after surgery) back to its normal site.

15. Verb. Destress and thus weaken a sound when pronouncing it.

16. Verb. Reduce in scope while retaining essential elements. "They won't reduce the story "; "The manuscript must be shortened"

17. Verb. Be cooked until very little liquid is left. "The sauce should reduce to one cup"

18. Verb. Cook until very little liquid is left. "The cook reduced the sauce by boiling it for a long time"

19. Verb. Lessen the strength or flavor of a solution or mixture. "Cut bourbon"

20. Verb. Take off weight.

Definition of Reduce

1. v. t. To bring or lead back to any former place or condition.

Definition of Reduce

1. Verb. (transitive) To bring down the size, quantity, quality, value or intensity of something; to diminish, to lower, to impair. ¹

2. Verb. (intransitive) To lose weight. ¹

3. Verb. (transitive) To bring to an inferior rank; to degrade, to demote. ¹

4. Verb. (transitive) To humble; to conquer; to subdue; to capture. ¹

5. Verb. (transitive) To bring to an inferior state or condition. ¹

6. Verb. (transitive cooking) To decrease the liquid content of food by boiling much of its water off. ¹

7. Verb. (transitive chemistry) To add electrons / hydrogen or to remove oxygen. ¹

8. Verb. (transitive metallurgy) To produce metal from ore by removing nonmetallic elements in a smelter. ¹

9. Verb. (transitive mathematics) To simplify an equation or formula without changing its value. ¹

10. Verb. (transitive legal) To convert to written form (Usage note: this verb almost always take the phrase "to writing"). ¹

¹ Source: wiktionary.com

Definition of Reduce

1. to diminish [v -DUCED, -DUCING, -DUCES] - See also: diminish

Medical Definition of Reduce

1. 1. To bring or lead back to any former place or condition. "And to his brother's house reduced his wife." (Chapman) "The sheep must of necessity be scattered, unless the great Shephered of souls oppose, or some of his delegates reduce and direct us." (Evelyn) 2. To bring to any inferior state, with respect to rank, size, quantity, quality, value, etc.; to diminish; to lower; to degrade; to impair; as, to reduce a sergeant to the ranks; to reduce a drawing; to reduce expenses; to reduce the intensity of heat. "An ancient but reduced family." "Nothing so excellent but a man may fasten upon something belonging to it, to reduce it." (Tillotson) "Having reduced Their foe to misery beneath their fears." (Milton) "Hester Prynne was shocked at the condition to which she found the clergyman reduced." (Hawthorne) 3. To bring to terms; to humble; to conquer; to subdue; to capture; as, to reduce a province or a fort. 4. To bring to a certain state or condition by grinding, pounding, kneading, rubbing, etc.; as, to reduce a substance to powder, or to a pasty mass; to reduce fruit, wood, or paper rags, to pulp. "It were but right And equal to reduce me to my dust." (Milton) 5. To bring into a certain order, arrangement, classification, etc.; to bring under rules or within certain limits of descriptions and terms adapted to use in computation; as, to reduce animals or vegetables to a class or classes; to reduce a series of observations in astronomy; to reduce language to rules. 6. To change, as numbers, from one denomination into another without altering their value, or from one denomination into others of the same value; as, to reduce pounds, shillings, and pence to pence, or to reduce pence to pounds; to reduce days and hours to minutes, or minutes to days and hours. To change the form of a quantity or expression without altering its value; as, to reduce fractions to their lowest terms, to a common denominator, etc. 7. To bring to the metallic state by separating from impurities; hence, in general, to remove oxygen from; to deoxidize; to combine with, or to subject to the action of, hydrogen; as, ferric iron is reduced to ferrous iron; or metals are reduced from their ores; opposed to oxidize. 8. To restore to its proper place or condition, as a displaced organ or part; as, to reduce a dislocation, a fracture, or a hernia. Reduced iron, metallic iron obtained through deoxidation of an oxide of iron by exposure to a current of hydrogen or other reducing agent. When hydrogen is used the product is called also iron by hydrogen. To reduce an equation, to reform the line or column from the square. Synonym: To diminish, lessen, decrease, abate, shorten, curtail, impair, lower, subject, subdue, subjugate, conquer. Origin: L. Reducere, reductum; pref. Red-. Re-, re- + ducere to lead. See Duke, and cf. Redoubt. Source: Websters Dictionary (01 Mar 1998)

Lexicographical Neighbors of Reduce

redstreaks redtail redtails redthroat redthroats redtop redtops redub redubbed redubbing

redubs reduc't reducant reducants reduce (current term) reduce to rubble reduced reduced cat reduced cats reduced circumstances

reduced enamel epithelium reduced eye reduced glutathione reduced haematin reduced haemoglobin reduced instruction set computer reduced instruction set computing reduced interarch distance reducement

Literary usage of Reduce

Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:

1. University Arithmetic: Embracing the Science of Numbers, and General Rules by Charles Davies (1876)
".reduce the following fractions to their lowest terms; 1. ... reduce 21. reduce 22. reduce CASE V. 151. To reduce a compound fraction to a simple fraction. ..."

2. University Arithmetic: Embracing the Science of Numbers, and General Rules by Charles Davies (1868)
"reduce the following fractions to common denominators: 1. ... reduce 6£ of 2, f, 5f, andj. NOTE.—We may often shorten the work of multiplying the numerator ..."

3. The University Arithmetic: Embracing the Science of Numbers, and Their by Charles Davies (1852)
"reduce -fs of a £ to the fraction of a penny. 4. reduce ^ of a day to the ... reduce T^-g of a cwt. to the fraction of a Ib. 15. reduce TT of a week to the ..."

4. University Arithmetic: Embracing the Science of Numbers, and General Rules by Charles Davies (1867)
"reduce £• to a decimal If we place a decimal point after the 5, and then write any number ... reduce f|f to its equivalent decimal. We here use two ciphers, ..."

Other Resources: