(じんこう)

じんこう
noun / pre-noun adjectival
artificial, man-made
1. artificial, man-made, synthetic
Made or produced by humans rather than occurring naturally. Used as a prefix or modifier for things created through human effort or technology.
人工(じんこう)知能(ちのう)研究(けんきゅう)(すす)んでいる。
Research on artificial intelligence is advancing.
この(みずうみ)人工(じんこう)のものだ。
This lake is man-made.
人工(じんこう)衛星(えいせい)から地球(ちきゅう)写真(しゃしん)撮影(さつえい)した。
Photographs of Earth were taken from an artificial satellite.

Not to be confused with the homophone 人口(じんこう) (population), which uses a different second kanji. 人工(じんこう) uses (こう) (craft, construction), while 人口(じんこう) uses (こう) (mouth, people). Often functions as a prefix in compound nouns.

COMMON COMPOUNDS:

  • 人工(じんこう)知能(ちのう) (artificial intelligence, AI)
  • 人工(じんこう)衛星(えいせい) (artificial satellite)
  • 人工(じんこう)呼吸(こきゅう) (artificial respiration)
  • 人工(じんこう)(しば) (artificial turf)
  • 人工(じんこう)甘味料(かんみりょう) (artificial sweetener)
  • 人工(じんこう)(てき) (artificial — as a na-adjective)