radioactive

Language: en

🇬🇧 /ˌreɪdɪəʊˈæktɪv/ 🇺🇸 /ˌreɪdiːoʊˈæktɪv/

📖 Definitions

  1. adjective
    Exhibiting or caused by radioactivity; emitting or relating to the emission of ionizing radiation or particles from the spontaneous disintegration of atomic nuclei.; Containing radioactive material or substances; contaminated with radioactive isotopes.; Figuratively, extremely dangerous, controversial, or likely to cause harm or backlash; politically toxic.; Of or relating to an isotope that undergoes radioactive decay; unstable in nuclear structure.

🔗 Details

Word forms

Comparative: more radioactive Superlative: most radioactive

Collocations

radioactive wasteradioactive materialradioactive decayradioactive contaminationradioactive falloutradioactive isotope

Derivatives

radioactivityradioactivelyradioactiveness

Synonyms

radiatingatomicnuclear

Antonyms

non-radioactivestable

Commonly confused

radiation
EN: 'Radiation' is the energy or particles emitted; 'radioactive' describes the property of a substance that emits radiation.
radiated
EN: 'Radiated' is the past tense of the verb 'radiate' (to emit energy); 'radioactive' is an adjective describing a substance capable of spontaneous nuclear decay.

Spelling tips

EN: Written as one word without a hyphen ('radioactive', not 'radio-active'). Note the single 'c' and the '-ive' ending.

💬 Examples

  1. The radioactive waste must be stored in a secure facility for thousands of years.

  2. Workers wore protective suits to handle the radioactive samples in the laboratory.

  3. After the scandal, the politician became radioactive and no one wanted to be seen with him.

  4. Carbon-14 is a radioactive isotope commonly used in archaeological dating.