later-, lateral-, -late, -lat, -lation, -lative

1. To remove or dissipate by melting, vaporization, erosion, etc.; for example, to ablate a metal surface with intense heat.
2. In medicine, to excise, amputate, or otherwise destroy the biological function; for example, of a body tissue.
3. To remove by erosion, melting, evaporation, vaporization, wearing, or wasting away.

1. Surgical excision, removal, or amputation of a body part or tissue.
2. The erosive processes by which a glacier is reduced; wearing or wasting away.
3. In aerospace: The dissipation of heat generated by atmospheric friction; especially, in the atmospheric reentry of a spacecraft or missile, by means of a melting heat shield.

1. Taking away or removing.BR> 2. Tending to ablate; that is, to be removed or vaporized at very high temperature: "The ablative material on a rocket cone fell off."
3. In grammar, applied to one of the cases of the noun in Latin and some other Indo-European languages; the fundamental meaning of the case being removal, separation, or taking away. indicating direction away from, or time when.

In some inflected languages, noting a case that has among its functions the indication of place from which or, as in Latin, place in which, manner, means, instrument, or agent.

The outer surface of a spacecraft or missile.

Ablation is the erosion of the protective outer surface (ablator) of a spacecraft or missile resulting from aerodynamic heating caused by travel at hypersonic speeds during reentry through the atmosphere.

1. A reference to the world's second largest ocean, which separates Europe and Africa from North and South America. Area: 82,400,000 sq. km. (31,800,000 sq. mi.).
2. Relating to or bordering the Atlantic Ocean.

1. Inclined, or intended, to waste time, to cause a delay, to gain time, and to lag behind.
2. Using cautious slow strategy to wear down the opposition; and so, avoiding direct confrontation and deferring a decision: "The congressman used a dilatory strategy to keep the bill from being passed."
3. Etymology: from Latin dilatorius; from dilator, "procrastinator", from dilatus, the past participle form of differe, "to delay".