synthetic

English

Etymology

From French synthétique, from Ancient Greek συνθετικός (sunthetikós).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sɪnˈθetɪk/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Adjective

synthetic (comparative more synthetic, superlative most synthetic)

1. Of, or relating to synthesis.
2. (chemistry) Produced by synthesis instead of being isolated from a natural source (but may be identical to a product so obtained).
   • 2013 August 10, “A new prescription”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:

     As the world's drug habit shows, governments are failing in their quest to monitor every London window-box and Andean hillside for banned plants. But even that Sisyphean task looks easy next to the fight against synthetic drugs. No sooner has a drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one.

3. Artificial, not genuine.
4. (grammar) Pertaining to the joining of bound morphemes in a word. Compare analytic.
5. (linguistics) Of a language, having a grammar principally dependent on the use of bound morphemes to indicate syntactic relationships. Compare analytic.

Derived terms

• nucleosynthetic
• syntheticism

Translations

of, or relating to synthesis

• Armenian: սինթետիկ (hy) (sintʿetik)
• Czech: syntetický
• French: synthétique (fr)
• Greek: συνθετικός (el) (synthetikós)
• Polish: syntetyczny (pl) m

• Portuguese: sintético (pt)
• Romanian: sintetic (ro)
• Russian: синтети́ческий (ru) (sintɛtíčeskij)
• Serbo-Croatian: sintetičan (sh)
• Tagalog: lagumlalangin

produced by chemical synthesis

• Armenian: սինթետիկ (hy) (sintʿetik)
• Czech: syntetický
• Greek: συνθετικός (el) (synthetikós)
• Portuguese: sintético (pt)

• Russian: синтети́ческий (ru) (sintɛtíčeskij)
• Serbo-Croatian: sintetičan (sh)
• Tagalog: ginanggang

artificial, not genuine

• Armenian: արհեստական (hy) (arhestakan)
• Czech: umělý (cs), falešný (cs), strojený
• Greek: συνθετικός (el) (synthetikós)
• Maori: horihori, parau
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: syntetisk

  Nynorsk: syntetisk

• Polish: syntetyczny (pl) m, sztuczny (pl) m

• Portuguese: artificial (pt), sintético (pt)
• Romanian: artificial (ro)
• Russian: синтети́ческий (ru) (sintɛtíčeskij), иску́сственный (ru) (iskússtvennyj)
• Scottish Gaelic: fuadain
• Serbo-Croatian: umjetan (sh)
• Spanish: sintético (es)
• Tagalog: lagumlalangin

pertaining to the joining of bound morphemes in a word

• Armenian: համադրական (hy) (hamadrakan), սինթետիկ (hy) (sintʿetik)
• Czech: syntetický

• Russian: синтети́ческий (ru) (sintɛtíčeskij)

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Bengali: ^{(please verify)} কৃত্রিম (kritrim)
• Catalan: ^{(please verify)} sintètic
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: ^{(please verify)} 合成的 (zh) (héchéng de)

• Esperanto: ^{(please verify)} sinteza
• German: ^{(please verify)} synthetisch (de)
• Ido: ^{(please verify)} sintezala (io)

• Japanese: ^{(please verify)} 合成 (ja) (ごうせい, gōsei)
• Khmer: ^{(please verify)} សំយោគ (km) (saŋyouk)
• Polish: ^{(please verify)} syntetyczny (pl)
• Spanish: ^{(please verify)} sintético (es)
• Thai: ^{(please verify)} สังเคราะห์ (th) (săngkrór)
• Turkish: ^{(please verify)} sentetik (tr)

Noun

synthetic (plural synthetics)

1. A synthetic compound.
   • 2007 January 14, Elsa Brenner, “Art House to Get a Campus”, in New York Times^[1]:

     Only plastics and synthetics that cannot be recycled will end up in landfills, he said.