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Glite Dictionary
📉 Not enough supply 🧪 Not full of substance 🎨 Pale or muted
undersaturated

undersaturated

7.1
Having less of a substance than it can hold
  • adjective
  • /ˌʌndərˈsætʃəreɪtɪd/
  • Specialized
translation icon : insaturado
  • In areas where the soil is undersaturated, plants struggle to absorb enough nutrients.

Examples

  • Comparing the shell structure with samples from aragonite-supersaturated regions elsewhere under a scanning electron microscope, we found severe levels of shell dissolution in the undersaturated region alone.

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  • The water in the aquarium is undersaturated with oxygen, which can harm the fish.

  • The paint was undersaturated, resulting in a pale color that lacked vibrancy.

Synonyms

unsaturated
vsundersaturated
  • Specialized
6.0

Able to dissolve more of a substance at the current temperature

is a general state of containing less than the maximum possible amount
nonsaturated
vsundersaturated
5.4

Not fully filled with liquid or moisture

is a precise state of containing less than the maximum possible amount

Antonyms

oversaturated
1 5.8

Having too much of something for a system or place to handle

How Saturated

supersaturated
  • Specialized
8.3
saturated
  • Specialized
5 4.7
undersaturated
  • Specialized
7.1
dilute
1 4.2

Surface Forms

undersaturated positive

Morphology

undersaturated = saturated (transparent) = under + saturate + ed

Formed by adding the productive prefix 'under-' (meaning 'below/less than') to the adjective 'saturated'; the resulting meaning 'not fully saturated' is directly derived.

Etymology

Undersaturated comes from under- and saturate, where saturate means 'to fill' and under- means 'not fully'. So undersaturated describes a liquid or air that is 'not fully filled' and can take more of a substance.