Library / English Dictionary

SIMPLIFY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected form: simplified   

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Make simpler or easier or reduce in complexity or extent

Example:

this move will simplify our lives

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "simplify" is one way to...):

alter; change; modify (cause to change; make different; cause a transformation)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "simplify"):

reduce (make less complex)

oversimplify (make too simple)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Antonym:

complicate (make more complicated)

Derivation:

simplification (the act of reducing complexity)

simplification (elimination of superfluous details)

simplification (an explanation that omits superfluous details and reduces complexity)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Specific molecular signature of disease, physiological measurement, genotype structural or functional characteristic, metabolic changes, or other determinant that may simplify the diagnostic process, make diagnoses more accurate, distinguish different causes of disease, or enable physicians to make diagnoses before symptoms appear and to track disease progression.

(Disease Marker, NCI Thesaurus)

Scientists at the University of Cambridge studying perovskite materials for next-generation solar cells and flexible LEDs have discovered that they can be more efficient when their chemical compositions are less ordered, vastly simplifying production processes and lowering cost.

(‘Messy’ production of perovskite material increases solar cell efficiency, University of Cambridge)

When combined with a simplified model of the solar system, the gravitational forces of the hypothesised disc can account for the unusual orbital architecture exhibited by some objects at the outer reaches of the solar system.

(Mystery orbits in outermost reaches of solar system not caused by ‘Planet Nine’, University of Cambridge)

Simplify your complicated interests, feelings, thoughts, wishes, aims; merge all considerations in one purpose: that of fulfilling with effect—with power—the mission of your great Master.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

“Then that will simplify matters.”

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)