(a.) To make less; to reduce; to make smaller, or fewer; to diminish; to lower; to degrade; as, to lessen a kingdom, or a population; to lessen speed, rank, fortune.
(v. i.) To become less; to shrink; to contract; to decrease; to be diminished; as, the apparent magnitude of objects lessens as we recede from them; his care, or his wealth, lessened.
Example Sentences:
(1) The transmission of alcoholism and its effects are thereby lessened for future generations of children of alcoholics.
(2) Bacteria can stop or lessen antibodies synthesis process.
(3) Behavioral variables, including interreinforcement interval and drug self-administration history, appear to be important determinants of whether or not reinforcement will be demonstrated, particularly among the benzodiazepines; but the range of conditions under which behavioral and pharmacological variables interact to promote or lessen the likelihood of self-administration of these drugs remains to be determined experimentally.
(4) "It is in my power to lessen their sentence – it's not excluded that that will happen."
(5) Diminished pressor responsiveness was considered to be due to concurrent reduction of central sympathetic vasomotor activity, because sympathetic nerve responses to hypothalamic stimulation were appreciably lessened in tripamide-treated SHR.
(6) The introduction of biological valves or of valves with a lessened risk of embolism is highly desirable in such cases.
(7) In this paper, these and related facts were summarized and some precautions were suggested to lessen the increase of resistant strains in this country.
(8) Recent improvements in surgical techniques and selective embolization have lessened the risks of surgical excision, decreased the blood loss, and diminished the time required for resection.
(9) We have previously shown that in the cat, taurine is an osmoprotective molecule that lessens mortality, neurological morbidity, and brain-cell dehydration during chronic hypernatremic dehydration.
(10) Rats given Sendai virus concurrently with the FCA, or any time after FCA was injected, did not have a lessened severity of the arthritic reaction, as compared with that in control animals.
(11) A decrease in relative risks since diagnosis of the first primary cancer was seen that may partly be attributed to a lessening of the intensity of medical surveillance with time.
(12) Incorporation of porosity into the grafts, which is necessary for tissue ingrowth, is expected to lessen this difference.
(13) The data strongly suggest that conferring the sick role on the mentally ill does not lessen rejection, but may, in some instances, increase social rejection.
(14) In contrast, hydroxyurea treatment was associated with a 1.5-fold to sevenfold increase in F cells and a 2.3- to 27-fold increase in the percentage of Hb F. In the three patients whose response reached a plateau, hydroxyurea treatment was associated with lessened hemolysis, decreased serum bilirubin and lactate dehydrogenase levels, and prolonged 51chromium-labeled RBC survival.
(15) O’Malley also called for: The relationship between federal immigration law enforcement and local law enforcement to be significantly lessened.
(16) Utilization of outpatient surgical centers helps reduce the cost of health care, lessens the disruption of patients' personal lives, and promotes their recovery through early ambulation and a lower incidence of postoperative nosocomial complications.
(17) It also lessened the hypertonus of isolated guinea-pig trachea caused by pilocarpine.
(18) The use of tissue allografts lessens patient morbidity and suffering and in many cases spares limbs and lives.
(19) Unlike acute combinations, chronic imipramine lessened the rate reducing effect of methadone.
(20) The results of a bronchial challenge to Aspergillus species, however, remained positive; these positive results suggest that long-term memory immune mechanisms may play an important role in the pathogenesis of hypersensitivity pneumonitis and lessen the importance of precipitins in establishing a diagnosis.
Shrivel
Definition:
(v. i.) To draw, or be drawn, into wrinkles; to shrink, and form corrugations; as, a leaf shriveles in the hot sun; the skin shrivels with age; -- often with up.
(v. t.) To cause to shrivel or contract; to cause to shrink onto corruptions.
Example Sentences:
(1) Labour’s vertiginous decline in Scotland has shrivelled what used to be the primary unionist party north of the border.
(2) The time when all the cells became shriveled divided by the cell count expressed in terms of 100,000 cells was used to compare cellular susceptibilities to free radical injury and the relative effectiveness of the antioxidants.
(3) Particles prepared from a low molecular weight (MW 43,000) homopolymer had a shrivelled appearance, but were not porous.
(4) These last elements consisted of prosecretory granules attached to flattened, empty-looking saccules showing buds at their surface; detached, more-or-less fenestrated, flattened saccules; and shrivelled residual trans-tubular networks.
(5) Notwithstanding the fiery rhetoric of the odd union leader , the movement's mainstream is painfully aware of its shrivelled size, and it lacks the cocksure confidence of those distant days when it thought it could count on full employment.
(6) In the recent past a miss so glaring might have left him cowed, his display shrivelling thereafter.
(7) Osborne's faith healing has shrivelled growth, and next year looks worse.
(8) The shrivelling of liberal and green Toryism creates space for the Lib Dems to be clearly differentiated from their frenemies in the coalition.
(9) Nothing suggested by his “big society” actually happened: on the contrary, charities took the full force of cuts to contracts and grants, and public society shrivelled measurably on his watch.
(10) The curator of the collection, Rajeev Sethi, told The New York Times: "The concept of art in public space is a very serious issue because art cannot shrivel up and shrink into investment portfolios or disappear into godowns [warehouses] or galleries.
(11) Some analysts say that his wealth has shrivelled from $28bn in early 2008 to $3.5bn.
(12) These results suggest that, at least acutely in a canine model, IMA graft flow is maintained above in situ levels even when grafted to a completely patent coronary artery and that acute competitive flow probably does not cause mammary artery shriveling.
(13) But it was never just external forces that caused the IPO market to shrivel: investors were also burnt by a series of offers that left them nursing losses.
(14) Constr-uction, once a booming industry, has shrivelled.
(15) In recent weeks the pro-Russian rebels have suffered a series of heavy defeats, losing large chunks of territory, with their empire shrivelled to the two major eastern cities of Donetsk and Luhansk.
(16) The players' revolt which split tennis asunder, shrivelled 1973's Wimbledon championships to a half-baked botch and kick-started a dramatic overturn in the century-long balance of power between the administrators and administered of any major worldwide sport, was triggered because a temperamental and reasonably good Yugoslavian player, Nikki Pilic, decided to play a well-paid doubles tournament in Montreal instead of (for a pittance) a Davis Cup tie for his country against New Zealand.
(17) In the buccopharynx, the major changes following treatment with cadmium were shrinkage of the stratified epithelial cells with shriveling of the microridges and loss of lateral contacts between neighboring epithelial cells.
(18) The question that hangs over the conference season as a whole is the purpose of these shrivelling, staged-managed affairs.
(19) He went fast, lest other patients' eyes lingered on the shrivelled figure.
(20) There were brambles along the hedgerow with shrivelled stalks, and berryless hawthorns.