a person or thing that separates a device for separating things into constituent parts, as milk into cream, etc
WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2025
sep•a•ra•tor /ˈsɛpəˌreɪtɚ/USA pronunciation
n. [countable]
WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2025- a person or thing that separates, esp. a device for separating cream from milk.
sep•a•ra•tor
(sep′ə rā′tər),USA pronunciation n.
- a person or thing that separates.
- any of various apparatus for separating one thing from another, as cream from milk, steam from water, or wheat from chaff.
- Electricitya device that prevents metal contact between plates of opposite charge in a storage battery.
- Mechanical Engineering[Mach.]retainer1 (def. 3).
- Late Latin sēparātor, equivalent. to Latin sēparā(re) to separate + -tor -tor
- 1600–10
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