aqua regia

Definitions

A mixture of three parts concentrated hydrochloric acid to one part concentrated nitric acid, named for its ability to dissolve gold.

archaic, uncountable

Equivalents

Examples

“Consider⟳ another example. If gold is placed in aqua regia then it dissolves. Aqua regia is a mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids that dissolves gold or platinum. Observation of gold dissolving in aqua regia (argument 1 1) lends credence to the above conditional statement. Not placing the gold into aqua regia and gold not dissolving (argument 0 0) does not disprove the truth-value of this conditional.”

CEFR level