radical

adj 1: (used of opinions and actions) far beyond the norm;

"extremist political views"; "radical opinions on

education"; "an ultra conservative" [syn: {extremist},

{ultra}]

2: markedly new or introducing radical change; "a revolutionary

discovery"; "radical political views" [syn: {revolutionary}]

3: arising from or going to the root; "a radical flaw in the

plan" [syn: {root}]

4: (linguistics) of or relating to or constituting a linguistic

root; "a radical verb form"

5: (botany) especially of leaves; located at the base of a

plant or stem; especially arising directly from the root

or rootstock or a root-like stem; "basal placentation";

"radical leaves" [syn: {basal}] [ant: {cauline}]

n 1: two or more atoms bound together as a single unit and

forming part of a molecule [syn: {group}]

2: an atom or group of atoms with at least one unpaired

electron; "in the body free radicals are high-energy

particles that ricochet wildly and damage cells" [syn: {free

radical}]

3: a person who has radical ideas or opinions

4: a character conveying the lexical meaning of a logogram

5: a sign placed in front of an expression to denote that a

root is to be extracted [syn: {radical sign}]

6: (linguistics) the form of a word after all affixes are

removed; "thematic vowels are part of the stem" [syn: {root},

{root word}, {base}, {stem}, {theme}]