substrate
noun
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With its Latin prefix sub-, "below", substrate obviously refers to a layer under something else. Rock may serve as the substrate for the coral in a coral reef. Tiny wafers of silicon (or another semiconductor) serve as the substrate for computer chips. Substrate may also mean subsoil—that is, the layer under the topsoil, lacking in organic matter or humus. Substrate is part of the vocabulary of various other sciences, including chemistry and biology. But although it's mostly a scientific term, writers may also use it to mean simply "foundation"—for instance, when observing that reading is the substrate on which most other learning is based.
Examples of substrate in a Sentence
Alan Ohnsman, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
Thinners, also byproducts of oil and natural gas processing, are also needed to print circuits onto silicon wafers that are the foundational substrate for chips.
—Miranda Jeyaretnam, Time, 15 May 2026
Additionally visitors to the booth could pick up a mushroom substrate that could be used as a fertilizer.
—Julie Gallant, San Diego Union-Tribune, 4 May 2026
The synthesis process consists of mixing bismuth ferrite with barium titanate to carefully engineer a strain, then growing the mixture as a thin film on a substrate that distorts its crystal structure.
—Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 29 Apr. 2026
See All Example Sentences for substrate
Cite this Entry
“Substrate.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/substrate. Accessed 20 May. 2026.
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substrate
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substrate
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