Applied linguistics is an interdisciplinary field of linguistics which identifies, investigates, and offers solutions to language-related real-life problems. Some of the academic fields related to applied linguistics are education, psychology, communication research, anthropology, and sociology.
Linguistics is the scientific study of language, and involves an analysis of language form, language meaning, and language in context. The earliest activities in the documentation and description of language have been attributed to the 6th century BC Indian grammarian Pāṇini, who wrote a formal description of the Sanskrit language in his Aṣṭādhyāyī.
Researchers have used laboratory experiments to improve our understanding of how radioactive atoms move through clay, contributing to safer radioactive waste disposal.