dispersion medium
- noun
- /dɪsˈpɜrʒən ˈmiːdiəm/
- Specialized
:
medio de dispersión
- The stability of the colloid depends on the choice of dispersion medium, such as oil or water.
Examples
-
In the experiment, water was used as the dispersion medium for the solid particles.
-
The particle size analysis was performed on a Malvern Mastersizer 2000 laser particle size analyzer, with ethyl alcohol as the dispersion medium.
Academic text (2018) -
To create a stable emulsion, a suitable dispersion medium must be chosen, like glycerin.
Synonyms
A liquid or gas that holds tiny particles, like air with smoke and water with milk particles
A liquid or gas that holds very small particles, for example water holding oil drops
Surface Forms
Morphology
The compound's meaning is directly compositional: 'dispersion' refers to particles being spread or dispersed and 'medium' denotes the substance or environment that carries/supports something, so together they denote the substance in which particles are dispersed. Although the term is technical, the semantic combination follows a transparent noun–noun pattern common across languages, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can infer the meaning.
Etymology
The noun dispersion medium comes from the image of tiny particles spread through a liquid or a gas, where the medium is the liquid or air that 'carries' the dispersion of those particles. So, it means the substance 'in which particles are dispersed' today.
