English

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Etymology

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semi- +‎ synthesize

Verb

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semisynthesize (third-person singular simple present semisynthesizes, present participle semisynthesizing, simple past and past participle semisynthesized)

  1. (chemistry) To synthesize partially, usually by incorporating natural components.
    • 1977, Harry Filmore Dowling, Fighting Infection: Conquests of the Twentieth Century, page 185:
      The 1,241st compound that they "semisynthesized" in this way looked particularly promising.
    • 2007, Marcus A. Hemminga, Lawrence Berliner, ESR Spectroscopy in Membrane Biophysics[1]:
      The EPL (expressed protein ligation, also named intein-mediated protein ligation IPL) technique can be used to semisynthesize proteins from recombinant and synthetic fragments, thus extending the size and complexity of the protein targets available to chemical engineering.
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