VERB
-
make a mathematical, chemical, or grammatical analysis of; break down into components or essential features
analyze a chemical compound
analyze a sentence
analyze a specimen - collapse due to fatigue, an illness, or a sudden attack
-
fall apart
Negotiations broke down
the building crumbled after the explosion -
make ineffective
Martin Luther King tried to break down racial discrimination - separate (substances) into constituent elements or parts
-
stop operating or functioning
The engine finally went
The coffee maker broke
The engine failed on the way to town
The car died on the road
her eyesight went after the accident
The bus we travelled in broke down on the way to town -
lose control of one's emotions
When she heard that she had not passed the exam, she lost it completely
When her baby died, she snapped - cause to fall or collapse
How To Use break down In A Sentence
- Exponible propositions generally break down into elements that are called exponent propositions; they explain or expound what is going on in the exponible proposition. Archive 2005-01-01
- Men are left idle when machines break down.
- To begin with the surface is coherent – now and again she smiles sadly at the charm he manages to bestow on that foul-smelling tannery – but as she turns the pages she sees it start to break down. Rachel Cusk | Portraits
- Ms. Fuchs believes the topic of safe sex isn't one where a parent can allow for a child to break down into the giggles and get squirmy. Mother Works to Make AIDS Education a Priority
- With a grid in place, you roughly break down the garden into distinct spaces.
- Internationally, there is widespread concern with a break down in community values in developed countries and unacceptable levels of isolation, loneliness and social disintegration, to which Ireland is not immune.
- Break down, see more with monoplegia or paraplegia , sometimes but limb paralysis, have disease urgenter, break down degree but can weigh gently.
- Claims that anti-cellulite creams can break down fat are controversial.
- And so, having such words, such poisonous concepts, they are forced into paradox to detoxify and break down these concepts. THE BROKEN GOD
- Acts xv. 1, and Galatians, passim; these do not judaize, but heathenize, seeking to throw off every yoke, to rid themselves not of the ceremonial law only, but also of the moral; and to break down every distinction separating the Church from a world lying in the wicked one. Epistles to the Seven Churches in Asia.
