virulent

CEFRC1

/ˈvɪɹ(j)ʊl(ə)nt/

adjective

Türkçe translations

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In plain English

  1. 01

    adjective

    Extremely harmful, poisonous, or infectious.

  2. 02

    adjective

    Showing strong hatred or anger.

Examples

  • Ebola is one of the most virulent viruses known to man.

  • One can't discount a global disaster like a virulent plague.

At a glance

Sits at C1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
2

Also pronounced

  • /-ɹ(j)ə-/

Deep Dive

adjective

Extra meanings

  1. Extremely hostile or malicious; intensely acrimonious.

  2. Of a disease or disease-causing agent: malignant, able to cause damage to the host.

  3. Of animals, plants, or substances: extremely venomous or poisonous.

More examples

In context

  • More venemous and much more virulent / Then any poyſoned tode, or any ſerpent.

  • The politicians were virulent in their hatred of the president.

  • They were targeted by a virulent strain of nativism toward those from Southern and Eastern Europe that was largely about race.

Antonyms

Quick test

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The blank virus spread quickly through the population and caused many deaths.

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Nearby

Origin

adjective

PIE word *wisós From Middle English virulent (“leaking or seeping pus, purulent; (of putrefaction) extremely severe (sense uncertain)”) [and other forms], borrowed from Latin vīrulentus (“poisonous”), from vīrus (“poison; venom; slime, slimy liquid; stinking smell; nasty taste”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wisós (“poison; slime; fluidity”)) + -ulentus (suffix meaning ‘abounding in, full of’, forming adjectives). Sense 4 (“of a pathogen: replicating within its host cell, then immediately causing it to undergo lysis”) is derived from French virulent, which was first used in this sense by the French biologist François Jacob (1920–2013) and his co-authors in a 1953 article.