annihilate

Verb

annihilate (third-person singular simple present annihilates, present participle annihilating, simple past and past participle annihilated)

1. To reduce to nothing, to destroy, to eradicate.
   • An atom bomb can annihilate a whole city.
   • But eagerness in this case, as in most others, annihilated its own delight; down came the tottering height, while the disappointed builder found relief for his sorrow in anger—sorrow's best remedy after all.1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 237

   Synonyms:

   benothing, destroy, eradicate, extinguish

2. (particle) To react with antimatter, producing gamma radiation and (for higher-mass reactants, especially composite particles such as protons) lighter particles (such as pions, muons, and neutrinos).
3. (archaic) To treat as worthless, to vilify.
   • of all the opinions which Antiquity hath had of men in gross, those which I most willingly embrace, and whereon I take most hold, are such as most vilifie, condemne, and annihilate us.1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 17, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC
4. (transitive) To render null and void; to abrogate.
   • The official Soviet criticism of 'bourgeois philosophy' took for granted that the latter in its various forms was a repetition of the idealist nonsense of Mach and Avenarius, which had been annihilated by Lenin's refutation.1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume II: The Golden Age, Oxford: Clarendon Press, translation of Główne nurty marksizmu: rozwój (in...
5. To cause to become zero by means of an annihilator operator.