acute
acute
(əkjuːt )1. adjective
You can use acute to indicate that an undesirable situation or feeling is very severe or intense.
The war has aggravated an acute economic crisis.
The report has caused acute embarrassment to the government.
The labour shortage is becoming acute.
2. adjective [ADJECTIVE noun]
3. adjective
In the dark my sense of hearing becomes so acute.
4. graded adjective
If you say that someone is acute or has an acute mind, you mean that they are quick to notice things and are able to understand them clearly.
Into her nineties, her thinking remained acute and her character forceful.
His relaxed exterior hides an extremely acute mind.
acuteness uncountable noun [oft the NOUN of noun]
Everything he writes demonstrates the acuteness of his intelligence.
6. adjective [ADJECTIVE noun, noun ADJECTIVE]
An acute accent is a symbol that is placed over vowels in some languages in order to indicate how that vowel is pronounced or over one letter in a word to indicate where it is stressed. You refer to a letter with this accent as, for example, e acute. For example, there is an acute accent over the letter 'e' in the French word 'café'.
