regulate

Borrowed from Latin regulatus, past participle of regulare (“to direct, rule, regulate”), from regula (“rule”), from regere (“to keep straight, direct, govern, rule”). Compare regle, rail.

• IPA^(key): /ˈɹɛɡjəleɪt/

• Audio (US)

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regulate (third-person singular simple present regulates, present participle regulating, simple past and past participle regulated)

1. To dictate policy.
2. To control or direct according to rule, principle, or law.
   • Macaulay

     the laws which regulate the successions of the seasons

   • Bancroft

     The herdsmen near the frontier adjudicated their own disputes, and regulated their own police.

3. To adjust to a particular specification or requirement: regulate temperature.
4. To adjust (a mechanism) for accurate and proper functioning.

   to regulate a watch, i.e. adjust its rate of running so that it will keep approximately standard time

   to regulate the temperature of a room, the pressure of steam, the speed of a machine, etc.

5. To put or maintain in order.

   to regulate the disordered state of a nation or its finances

   to regulate one's eating habits

• deregulate
• downregulate
• upregulate

• rule
• ruler
• regular
• regulation
• regulator

• regulate in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• regulate in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

• legature

rēgulāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of rēgulō