operated

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of operate.

   The surgeons operated late into the night to save the patient.

   For decades the company operated three mills along the river.

   Note

   One spelling does double duty: the plain past (the company operated three mills) and the participle after have or be (had operated, was operated). Which of those works depends on the verb's use. Running a machine or a business is transitive, so it passivizes freely: the mills were operated by the company. The "take effect" uses are intransitive only (the medicine operated quickly), so they have no passive.

2. 2
   adjectivein compounds

   Powered or controlled by the specific means named, such as a battery-operated toy or a hand-operated pump.

   The museum displayed a foot-operated sewing machine from the early 1900s.

   Remotely operated drones surveyed the disaster zone from a safe distance.

   Similarpowered, driven, controlled

   Note

   A combining form more than a free adjective, it almost always follows a word naming the power or the control: battery-, hand-, foot-, coin-. Before a noun the pair takes a hyphen (a coin-operated laundry). When the first word is an -ly adverb, the hyphen drops (remotely operated drones). Without its partner the word loses this meaning, which is why the means is always spelled out.

3. 3
   adjective

   Having undergone a surgical operation; said of a patient or of the body part that was treated.

   The surgeon checked the operated shoulder during the follow-up visit.

   Operated limbs require careful monitoring for early signs of infection.

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