Definition of "electro-negative" [e•lec•tro-neg•a•tive]

• Having the property of being attracted by an electro-positive body, or a tendency to pass to the positive pole in electrolysis, by the law that opposite electricities attract each other. Contrasted with <contr>neutral</contr> and <contr>electropositive</contr> (adjective)
• Negative; nonmetallic; acidic; -- opposed to <contr>positive</contr>, <contr>metallic</contr>, or <contr>basic</contr>. (adjective)
• Carrying a negative electrical charge. (adjective)
• Having a tendency to take up electrons and form negative ions; having a relatively positive electrode potential. (adjective)
• A body which passes to the positive pole in electrolysis; an anion. (noun)

Gnu Collaboartive International Dictionary of English: licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

• "When in action, that effect is neutralized from the fact that carbon in chromic acid is more highly electro-negative than the chromate of mercury formed upon the zinc amalgam, and which appears to be the cause of the dissolution of the zinc even when amalgamated in the presence of chromic acid."
• "Ores must be distinguished as good and bad conductors; the former may serve directly as anodes, and are easily oxidized by the electro-negative radicals formed at their contact, and dissolve readily in the electrolyte."
• "It was thus that man in this state of consciousness was compelled to picture the foundation of the physical universe as being made up of gravity and electricity, as we meet them in the modern picture of the atom, with its heavy electro-positive nucleus and the virtually weightless electro-negative electrons moving round it."