Word.ws English Dictionary

sub-atomic

sub-atomic is the alternative spelling of subatomic.

Meaning of subatomic

Adjective

subatomic (not comparable)

  1. Relating to particles that are constituents of the atom, or are smaller than an atom; such as proton, neutron, electron, etc.
    • We humans are so stuck in the middle of the cosmic scales — in average height, one-hundredth of one-septillionth (10^-24) the size of the observable universe, and with typical life spans of a couple octillion attoseconds. And an attosecond is an eternity compared with the lifetime of the elusive...2023 October 9, Dennis Overbye, “The Science Nobel Winners Were Short and Fast”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 12 Oct 2023
  2. Relating to something that is smaller in scale than the diameter of a hydrogen atom.
    • The electron microscope is able to resolve detail at the subatomic level.

Questions about sub-atomic

What is sub-atomic the alternative spelling of?
Sub-atomic is the alternative spelling of subatomic.

Words near sub-atomic in the dictionary

  1. sub-admiral
  2. sub-admirals
  3. sub-apartment
  4. sub-apartments
  5. sub-aqueous
  6. sub-atomic
  7. sub-audible
  8. sub-audio frequency
  9. sub-balanic
  10. sub-band
  11. sub-basement

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sub-atomic (page history and authors); subatomic (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “sub-atomic.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sub-atomic. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.