Etymology

semimetal

S1E1M3I1M3E1T1A1L1

Today it means: A solid of which the conduction and valence band overlap slightly in energy. Full definition →

English metal ← Middle English metal ← Old French meta
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*sem-
  2. Proto-Indo-European*sēmi
  3. Latinsēmi-
  4. Englishsemi-
  5. Latinmetallum
  6. Old Frenchmeta
  7. Middle Englishmetal
  8. Englishmetal
  9. English todaysemimetal

From semi- + metal.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.