antimicrobial

1. 1.

   an agent (as heat or radiation or a chemical) that destroys microorganisms that might carry disease

   Synonymsdisinfectantgermicideantimicrobic

   Broaderagent

   Narrowercetrimidesodium hypochlorite

1. 1.

   capable of destroying or inhibiting the growth of disease-causing microorganisms

   Synonymsantimicrobic

   Similarhealthful

Other forms of antimicrobial

plural

antimicrobials·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about antimicrobial

What does antimicrobial mean?

antimicrobial means "an agent (as heat or radiation or a chemical) that destroys microorganisms that might carry disease". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in antimicrobial?

antimicrobial has 6 syllables: an-ti-mi-cro-bi-al. The stress falls on "bi".

What is another word for antimicrobial?

Close synonyms include disinfectant, germicide, antimicrobic, antimicrobic. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is antimicrobial a common word?

antimicrobial is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.