Nuclear

How to spell nuclear

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce nuclear

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does nuclear mean?

1. adjectiveRelating to the nucleus of an atom, or to the energy and weapons that come from atomic reactions.
2. adjectiveForming the central or core unit of something, as in a household of parents and their children.

Nuclear in a sentence

• The country agreed to dismantle part of its nuclear arsenal.

• The survey focused on the modern nuclear family of two parents and one child.

• The plant generates electricity from a nuclear reactor.

• These principles form the nuclear structure of the whole project.

Where does nuclear come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin nucleus, which literally meant 'a little nut' or 'kernel', a diminutive formed from nux (genitive nucis), the ordinary Latin word for 'nut'. Scientists adopted nucleus in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to name the central core of various structures, first in biology for the heart of a living cell and later in physics for the dense centre of an atom. The adjective 'nuclear' was coined from that scientific noun in the nineteenth century, simply meaning 'belonging to a nucleus', and it surged into everyday use in the twentieth century with the rise of atomic energy and weapons. The spelling preserves the Latin stem nucle- followed by the adjective ending -ar, which is exactly why the order of those final letters matters: the correct form is nucle-ar, even though many speakers slip into saying 'nucular' and then write it that way. Keeping the kernel idea (nucle-) firmly in mind, then adding -ar, is the reliable guard against that very common error.

How the word is built

• nucle- (from Latin nucleus: kernel, core)
• -ar (adjective suffix meaning 'relating to')