What's the difference between desert and desolate?

Desert


Definition:

  • (n.) That which is deserved; the reward or the punishment justly due; claim to recompense, usually in a good sense; right to reward; merit.
  • (n.) A deserted or forsaken region; a barren tract incapable of supporting population, as the vast sand plains of Asia and Africa are destitute and vegetation.
  • (n.) A tract, which may be capable of sustaining a population, but has been left unoccupied and uncultivated; a wilderness; a solitary place.
  • (a.) Of or pertaining to a desert; forsaken; without life or cultivation; unproductive; waste; barren; wild; desolate; solitary; as, they landed on a desert island.
  • (v. t.) To leave (especially something which one should stay by and support); to leave in the lurch; to abandon; to forsake; -- implying blame, except sometimes when used of localities; as, to desert a friend, a principle, a cause, one's country.
  • (v. t.) To abandon (the service) without leave; to forsake in violation of duty; to abscond from; as, to desert the army; to desert one's colors.
  • (v. i.) To abandon a service without leave; to quit military service without permission, before the expiration of one's term; to abscond.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) It will act as a further disincentive for women to seek help.” When Background Briefing visited Catherine Haven in February, the refuge looked deserted, and most of its rooms were empty, despite the town having one of the highest domestic violence rates in the state.
  • (2) Eleven virus strains were isolated from ticks Hyalomma asiaticum asiaticum Schulce et Schlottke, 1929, and Hyalomma plumbeum plumbeum Panzer, 1796,collected in 1971-1974 in desert regions of the Uzbee S.S.R.
  • (3) Giving voice to that sentiment the mass-selling daily newspaper Ta Nea dedicated its front-page editorial to what it hoped would soon be the group's demise, describing Alexopoulos' desertion as a "positive development".
  • (4) Rising losses among the nearly 350,000-strong Afghan army and police, and a desertion rate of about 50,000 a year, also support Karzai's contention that control of large parts of the country remains tenuous.
  • (5) An opening sequence described as “spectacular” by Amazon insiders – featuring 6,000 extras in the Californian desert, according to some reports – is estimated to have cost £2.5m alone.
  • (6) Motion’s inner dialogue with his father’s memory coloured his own mission to Germany, but he was conscious of the incongruity of his presence among the Desert Rats.
  • (7) Forty soil samples from different desert localities in Kuwait were surveyed for keratinophilic and geophilic dermatophytic fungi.
  • (8) The disappointing weather at Easter left beaches deserted but some Britons, who were determined to enjoy the outdoors this time round, have already had their plans thwarted by the weather, taking to websites such as ukcampsite.co.uk to swap tales of woe, such as farmers calling to cancel bookings because sites were waterlogged.
  • (9) Harman said the reasons that made some voters desert Labour for Ukip were not all about Europe , but broader issues.
  • (10) Mali: a guide to the conflict Read more In response, the Tuareg separatists attacked military and police points as far as Tenenkou in the south, to prove it still controlled vast swaths of the desert territory.
  • (11) Natural foci of zoonotic cutaneous leishmaniasis are located mainly in the deserts of Middle Asia.
  • (12) Further south is Ghadames, one of the most ancient settlements in north Africa , which Unesco calls “the pearl of the desert”.
  • (13) The far western deserts of China have been filled with wind farms and solar panels.
  • (14) "It wasn't a case of a Labour party that had deserted its principles," he said.
  • (15) Average prevalence for the country as a whole for people above the age of 10 was 4.3%, with distinct geographical differences: 5.7% in urban areas, 4.1% in rural agricultural areas, and 1.5% in rural desert areas.
  • (16) squeaks Tess, spinning around outside the reception at MediaCityUK, pointing at the deserted metallic acropolis.
  • (17) There is, however, a converse way of looking at the situation, Which is often neglected but which may be of general biological interest: does the evolution of adaptations to desert environments necessarily involve loss of viability in more mesic habitats?
  • (18) Although it is the world's biggest CO2 emitter and notorious for building the equivalent of a 400MW coal-fired power station every three days, it is also erecting 36 wind turbines a day and building a robust new electricity grid to send this power thousands of miles across the country from the deserts of the west to the cities of the east.
  • (19) Back to article (4) Here I asked him about Barry White, a Desert Island Disc choice of his in 1978, which he had no recollection of.
  • (20) The fighters now look fat in winter combat jackets of as many different camouflage patterns as the origins of their units, hunched against a freezing wind that whips off the desert scrub.

Desolate


Definition:

  • (a.) Destitute or deprived of inhabitants; deserted; uninhabited; hence, gloomy; as, a desolate isle; a desolate wilderness; a desolate house.
  • (a.) Laid waste; in a ruinous condition; neglected; destroyed; as, desolate altars.
  • (a.) Left alone; forsaken; lonely; comfortless.
  • (a.) Lost to shame; dissolute.
  • (a.) Destitute of; lacking in.
  • (v. t.) To make desolate; to leave alone; to deprive of inhabitants; as, the earth was nearly desolated by the flood.
  • (v. t.) To lay waste; to ruin; to ravage; as, a fire desolates a city.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Downtown LA is improving, but for years it was a desolate hell zone of freeways, office blocks and closed stores.
  • (2) The coast here feels like an island, desolate and full of surprises.
  • (3) The Eritrean government requires every pupil to complete their final year of high school by serving in Sawa Military Camp, in the desolate, semi-desert region of eastern Eritrea .
  • (4) But for the next few hours, though, there's little to excite us: Joseph Weisenthal (@TheStalwart) The economic data calendar is a desolate wasteland of nothingness.
  • (5) When it is not clogged with weekend traffic, Container – the English word is used in Arabic – is a desolate spot: a lonely stretch of asphalt, four dingy tollbooth-like structures painted white and green, a few bored Israeli soldiers with automatic rifles.
  • (6) They are kept in a small pen behind the Lion's Den, a pub on a ranch in desolate countryside 75 miles south of Johannesburg.
  • (7) It was after the Indian wars of the 1870s that the indigenous tribes started to be consigned to reservations – on the worst, most desolate lands for grazing or growing crops.
  • (8) And, Jinkyo-En which was a desolate waste has come to an oasis in life for the Hansenites.
  • (9) The first time I saw the building - a stark, unapologetically angular silver bunker throwing back the heat of a rather desolate part of Berlin - I was content to register its disturbance without question, submitting to its strategies of oppression and disorientation as a child would.
  • (10) "Given the complexity of this crisis and the extent of the distress of our people from the north … we must together, I say together, clear the path ahead to free our country from these invaders, who only leave desolation, deprivation and pain in their wake."
  • (11) And it's Christmas bonanza time along the high streets of Britain, where Oxfam outlets and estate agents lie lonely amid empty sites and desolate closed doors.
  • (12) Australian visual effects wizard Dave Clayton has been nominated for his work on The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.
  • (13) But, like many streets in New York City and in cities across the US, it is becoming increasingly desolate.
  • (14) Season two crafted complex characters racked with existential ambivalence – heroines marked for the abyss, fragile, flammable outcasts and desolate prodigies, all of whose private pain was as palpable as the crimson bloodbath head witch Evelyn Poole soaks in.
  • (15) Instead, they suggest expanding the scope of services in family planning clinics, out of an awareness that the continuing high prevalence of unintended childbearing, among the young and disadvantaged in particular, is part of a larger problem of living in a desolate social environment.
  • (16) "I watched this guy brushing off dirt from a skull in the most desolate landscape and right then I just knew," Rincón said of his first encounter with palaeontology.
  • (17) There was nothing to see for miles but sage-covered high desert, a landscape of stark beauty and eerie desolation.
  • (18) The contemporary state of the sub-discipline of endocrinology within the framework of internal medicine is generally considered rather desolate, but so far actual data were lacking.
  • (19) Howell said in July: "There are large uninhabited and desolate areas, certainly up in the north-east where there's plenty of room for fracking well away from anyone's residence where it can be conducted without any kind of threat to the rural environment."
  • (20) A subroutine called DESOL for the numerical solution of ordinary differential equations of the type arising in biological simulation problems is described.