PANDEMIC: noun. It is a disease that affects the majority of the population of a state, country or even the world. The roots are pan (Greek for “common”), demos (Greek for “people”) and its suffix is ic (which has the sense of “having the characteristic of”. The correct expression is thus, pandemic disease but by apocopation the word disease has been removed and only Pandemic remains, and it has become a noun.
DISREPUTABLE: adjective, said of people, institutions or ideas that have a bad reputation. “Dis” is the prefix and it comes from Latin and it means away, apart or asunder (which means that whatever follows the prefix is far from taking place). The root is “repute”, which comes from Latin and means to think of something as equivalent to”. Finally there is the suffix able, which means “susceptible of, capable of”. The word thus means without a proper reputation.
INTRACELLULAR: adjective, the first part of the word is the prefix “Intra” which means “within” and comes from Latin. The root is “Celull”, which also comes from Latin and means “small room”. Finally the suffix “ar” which also comes from Latin and which means “pertaining to”. The word means then, something that pertains to what is within a small room.
MEDIATE: verb, the root is “Medium” meaning in the middle and the suffix “ate”, which is a suffix that is used to turn nouns or adjectives into verbs in both Latin and English. The word means literally “to be in the middle” of belligerents.
