pesticide

Definitions

pest (a harmful creature) + -i- (linking vowel) + cide (killer) = a substance that kills pests. Here -cide names a thing, not a deed — the killer chemical. The same pattern stamps out a whole product family: herbicide (kills plants), insecticide (insects), fungicide (fungi), bactericide (bacteria).

Why It Means This

Pesticide shows the root's modern industrial life. The ancient -cide named killers of people (homicide); twentieth-century chemists reused it as a naming stamp for killers of organisms. Attach -cide to whatever you want gone — pests, herbs, insects, fungi, bacteria — and you have its killer. The linking -i- is just there to make the word say smoothly.

Common Collocations

• 1.pesticide residue农药残留
• 2.spray pesticide喷洒农药
• 3.pesticide use农药使用
• 4.chemical pesticide化学农药

Example Sentences

• 1.

  Farmers sprayed pesticide to protect the wheat from insects.

• 2.

  Heavy pesticide use can harm bees and other pollinators.