Inhibitor

How to spell inhibitor

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce inhibitor

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does inhibitor mean?

1. nounA substance or agent that slows down, restrains or prevents a chemical reaction or biological process.

Inhibitor in a sentence

• The engineers added a corrosion inhibitor to protect the pipework.

• This medication acts as an enzyme inhibitor to lower blood pressure.

Where does inhibitor come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin verb inhibere, meaning 'to hold back', 'to restrain' or 'to check', which was formed from the prefix in- ('in' or 'against') and habere, the very common verb meaning 'to have' or 'to hold'. English already had the verb 'inhibit' by the 1400s, used at first in the senses of forbidding or restraining, and the agent noun 'inhibitor', meaning 'something that holds back or slows', was built onto it later. The word became especially common in the twentieth century when chemistry and biology needed a precise term for a substance that slows or prevents a reaction, such as a rust inhibitor or an enzyme inhibitor. The same habere root sits inside a whole family of English words, including 'habit', 'inhabit' and 'prohibit', which is a useful reminder that the spelling carries -hibit-, not -hibbit-. The single b and single t in the middle are the quiet trap: the unstressed syllables tempt writers toward doubling, but the Latin root keeps each consonant single.

How the word is built

• in- (in, against)
• -hibit- (from Latin habere: to hold, to keep)
• -or (agent noun: a thing that does the action)