insulate

From Latin īnsula (“isle, island”) +‎ -ate (verb-forming suffix) or from Late Latin īnsulātus (“made an island”), see etymology at -ate. First attested in the 16th century; the general verb īnsulō (“insulate”) is attested only in New Latin and postdates the English term, but influence from an otherwise unattested Medieval Latin counterpart cannot be ruled out.^[1] Piecewise doublet of isolate.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɪnsjʊleɪt/, /ˈɪnʃʊleɪt/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɪnsʊleɪt/, /ˈɪnsəleɪt/
• (Canada) IPA^(key): [ˈɪns(j)ʊle(ɪ)t]

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: in‧su‧late

insulate (third-person singular simple present insulates, present participle insulating, simple past and past participle insulated)

1. To separate, detach, or isolate.
2. To separate a body or material from others, e.g. by non-conductors to prevent the transfer of electricity, heat, etc.

   Ceramic can be used to insulate power lines.

• isolate

insulate (not comparable)

1. Of pollen or spores, with superficial ornamentation grouped in circular or polygonal areas separated by grooves.
   • 1983, Walter H. Lewis, ‎Prathibha Vinay, ‎Vincent E. Zenger, Airborne and Allergenic Pollen of North America, page 239:

     Among nonwinged grains, the sexine is rugulate, insulate, or microverrucate.

   • [2017, Bee Products – Chemical and Biological Properties:

     Pollen insulate when the elements are grouped in circular or polygonal areas separated by grooves.]

• “insulate”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “insulate”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

• alunites

īnsulāte

1. vocative masculine singular of īnsulātus