The verb if first attested in 1530, the adjective in 1626; borrowed from Latin attenuātus, the perfect passive participle of attenuō (see -ate (verb-forming suffix) and -ate (adjective-forming suffix)), from ad- (“to, towards, at”) + tenuo (“to make thin”), itself from tenuis (“thin”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix).

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /əˈtɛn.juˌeɪt/

  • Audio (US):

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• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /əˈten.jʉˌæɪt/
• Hyphenation: at‧ten‧u‧ate

attenuate (third-person singular simple present attenuates, present participle attenuating, simple past and past participle attenuated)

1. (transitive) To reduce in size, force, value, amount, or degree.
   • 1874, Thomas Hardy, chapter 40, in Far From the Madding Crowd:

     A manor-house clock from the far depths of shadow struck the hour, one, in a small, attenuated tone.

2. (transitive) To make thinner, as by physically reshaping, starving, or decaying.
   • 1899, Stephen Crane, chapter 4, in His New Mittens:

     Clumps of attenuated turkeys were suspended here and there.

   • 1906, E. Phillips Oppenheim, chapter 1, in The Malefactor:

     Lovell, wan and hollow-eyed, his arm in a sling, his once burly frame gaunt and attenuated with disease, nodded.

3. (intransitive) To become thin or fine; to grow less.
4. (transitive) To weaken.
   • 1851, Sir Francis Palgrave, chapter IV, in The History of Normandy and of England:

     We may reject and reject till we attenuate history into sapless meagreness.

5. (transitive) To rarefy.
   • 1900 December – 1901 August, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter 23, in The First Men in the Moon, London: George Newnes,[…], published 1901, →OCLC:

     "It speedily became apparent that the entire strangeness of our circumstances and surroundings—great loss of weight, attenuated but highly oxygenated air, consequent exaggeration of the results of muscular effort, rapid development of weird plants from obscure spores, lurid sky—was exciting my companion unduly."

6. (transitive, medicine) To reduce the virulence of a bacterium or virus.
7. (transitive, electronics) To reduce the amplitude of an electrical, radio, or optical signal.
8. (brewing) Of a beer, to become less dense as a result of the conversion of sugar to alcohol.
   • 2009 July–August, John Palmer, “Attenuation: Advanced Brewing”, in Brew Your Own‎^[1], archived from the original on 6 October 2013:

     A beer which does not attenuate to the expected level in fermentation will have more residual sugar and thus be sweeter and heavier-bodied.

• (antonym(s) of “electronics”): amplify
• strengthen
• intensify

attenuate (comparative more attenuate, superlative most attenuate)

1. Slender, thin.
2. (in consistency) Rarefied, thin, refined.
3. (botany, of leaves) Gradually tapering into a petiole-like extension toward the base.

• subattenuate

attenuate

1. inflection of attenuare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

attenuate f pl

1. feminine plural of attenuato

attenuāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of attenuō

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