Reducing

4 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Reduce \Re*duce"\ (r[-e]*d[=u]s"), v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Reduced}
     (-d[=u]st"),; p. pr. & vb. n. {Reducing} (-d[=u]"s[i^]ng).]
     [L. reducere, reductum; pref. red-. re-, re- + ducere to
     lead. See {Duke}, and cf. {Redoubt}, n.]
     1. To bring or lead back to any former place or condition.
        [Obs.]


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              And to his brother's house reduced his wife.
                                                    --Chapman.
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              The sheep must of necessity be scattered, unless the
              great Shephered of souls oppose, or some of his
              delegates reduce and direct us.       --Evelyn.
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     2. To bring to any inferior state, with respect to rank,
        size, quantity, quality, value, etc.; to diminish; to
        lower; to degrade; to impair; as, to reduce a sergeant to
        the ranks; to reduce a drawing; to reduce expenses; to
        reduce the intensity of heat. "An ancient but reduced
        family." --Sir W. Scott.
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              Nothing so excellent but a man may fasten upon
              something belonging to it, to reduce it.
                                                    --Tillotson.
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              Having reduced
              Their foe to misery beneath their fears. --Milton.
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              Hester Prynne was shocked at the condition to which
              she found the clergyman reduced.      --Hawthorne.
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     3. To bring to terms; to humble; to conquer; to subdue; to
        capture; as, to reduce a province or a fort.
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     4. To bring to a certain state or condition by grinding,
        pounding, kneading, rubbing, etc.; as, to reduce a
        substance to powder, or to a pasty mass; to reduce fruit,
        wood, or paper rags, to pulp.
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              It were but right
              And equal to reduce me to my dust.    --Milton.
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     5. To bring into a certain order, arrangement,
        classification, etc.; to bring under rules or within
        certain limits of descriptions and terms adapted to use in
        computation; as, to reduce animals or vegetables to a
        class or classes; to reduce a series of observations in
        astronomy; to reduce language to rules.
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     6. (Arith.)
        (a) To change, as numbers, from one denomination into
            another without altering their value, or from one
            denomination into others of the same value; as, to
            reduce pounds, shillings, and pence to pence, or to
            reduce pence to pounds; to reduce days and hours to
            minutes, or minutes to days and hours.
        (b) To change the form of a quantity or expression without
            altering its value; as, to reduce fractions to their
            lowest terms, to a common denominator, etc.
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     7. (Chem.) To add an electron to an atom or ion.
        Specifically: To remove oxygen from; to deoxidize.
        (Metallurgy) To bring to the metallic state by separating
        from combined oxygen and impurities; as, metals are
        reduced from their ores. (Chem.) To combine with, or to
        subject to the action of, hydrogen or any other reducing
        agent; as, ferric iron is reduced to ferrous iron;
        aldehydes can be reduced to alcohols by lithium hydride;
        -- opposed to {oxidize}.
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     8. (Med.) To restore to its proper place or condition, as a
        displaced organ or part; as, to reduce a dislocation, a
        fracture, or a hernia.
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     {Reduced iron} (Chem.), metallic iron obtained through
        deoxidation of an oxide of iron by exposure to a current
        of hydrogen or other reducing agent. When hydrogen is used
        the product is called also {iron by hydrogen}.
  
     {To reduce an equation} (Alg.), to bring the unknown quantity
        by itself on one side, and all the known quantities on the
        other side, without destroying the equation.
  
     {To reduce an expression} (Alg.), to obtain an equivalent
        expression of simpler form.
  
     {To reduce a square} (Mil.), to reform the line or column
        from the square.
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     Syn: To diminish; lessen; decrease; abate; shorten; curtail;
          impair; lower; subject; subdue; subjugate; conquer.
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Reducing \Re*du"cing\ (r?*d?"s?ng),
     a & n. from {Reduce}.
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     {Reducing furnace} (Metal.), a furnace for reducing ores.
  
     {Reducing pipe fitting}, a pipe fitting, as a coupling, an
        elbow, a tee, etc., for connecting a large pipe with a
        smaller one.
  
     {Reducing valve}, a device for automatically maintaining a
        diminished pressure of steam, air, gas, etc., in a pipe,
        or other receiver, which is fed from a boiler or pipe in
        which the pressure is higher than is desired in the
        receiver.
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From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  reducing
       n 1: any process in which electrons are added to an atom or ion
            (as by removing oxygen or adding hydrogen); always
            occurs accompanied by oxidation of the reducing agent
            [syn: {reduction}]
       2: loss of excess weight (as by dieting); becoming slimmer; "a
          doctor supervised her reducing"

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  23 Moby Thesaurus words for "reducing":
     abating, allaying, alleviating, assuaging, blunting,
     calorie-counting, chastening, cushioning, dampening, damping,
     deadening, diminishing, dulling, easing, lessening, mitigating,
     relaxing, slenderizing, slimming, softening, subduing, tempering,
     weight-watching