dissolved

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of dissolve.

   The salt dissolved completely once the broth came to a boil.

   The old contracts were dissolved when the partnership ended.

   Note

   One spelling does two jobs, and the verb's split between transitive and intransitive uses shows which is which. Sugar that dissolved did it by itself, while contracts that were dissolved had it done to them. Only the transitive meanings (disbanding, destroying, melting something down) take the passive with be. The intransitive ones still form the perfect with have, as in the salt has dissolved.

2. 2
   adjective

   Broken down within a solvent so that it is spread throughout the liquid as part of a solution.

   The dissolved minerals give the spring water its slightly salty taste.

   Engineers measured the dissolved oxygen at several depths in the lake.

   Oppositeundissolved, particulate, suspended

   Note

   The solution sense alone, narrower than the verb behind it. A dissolved parliament or partnership belongs to the past participle of the disbanding meaning, not to this adjective. Here a substance is spread through a solvent as a true solution rather than floating as a suspension. It can also be graded, as in more dissolved and most dissolved, to describe how far a substance has gone into solution.

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