depopulate
verb [usually passive]Verb Forms
| present simple I / you / we / they depopulate | |
| he / she / it depopulates | |
| past simple depopulated | |
| past participle depopulated | |
| -ing form depopulating |
to reduce the number of people living in a place 使人口减少 Word Originmid 16th cent. (in the sense ‘ravage, lay waste’): from Latin depopulat- ‘ravaged’, from the verb depopulari, from de- ‘completely’ + populari ‘lay waste’ (from populus ‘people’).