the.com/sterilizer

means A device that uses heat, steam, or chemicals to destroy bacteria, viruses, and other microorganisms on equipment or instruments.

from From 'sterilize,' built on 'sterile' — Latin 'sterilis,' meaning barren or unfruitful, originally describing soil or wombs that produced nothing. The word traveled from 'incapable of reproducing life' to 'incapable of harboring it,' and by the late 1800s, as germ theory took hold, 'sterilize' narrowed to its modern sense: making something germ-free by force. The '-izer' just tacks on the machine that does the deed.