lysis

Etymology

It is borrowed from New Latin lysis,^[2][3][4][5] from Ancient Greek λύσις (lúsis, “a loosening, release; dissolution”),^{[2][3][6][7][8]} from λύω (lúō, “to loosen, untie, release”).^[9][6][8][7] The OED takes it partly from Latin and partly directly from Greek.^[10] Merriam-Webster Unabridged notes that the Greek noun already meant the remission of a fever.^[3] The biological sense was probably taken from the ending of words such as haemolysis and bacteriolysis, that is, from -lysis.^[10][11][9] Etymonline and the American Heritage Dictionary trace the Greek verb to Proto-Indo-European *leu- (“to loosen, divide, cut apart”),^[9][2] and Klein relates it to λύτρον (lútron, “ransom”), Latin luō (“to loose, release; to atone for”) and Old English forlēosan (“to lose; to destroy”), and so to lose.^[6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The gradual decline of a disease: Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates this sense to 1543,^[3] and the Shorter Oxford to the mid-16th century,^[11] while the OED's first record is from 1834, in a medical textbook.^[10] Dictionary.com gives 1815–25.^[5]

Semantic evolution

In medicine the word was used for a gradual recovery from a disease or fever, as opposed to a crisis, a sudden turn;^[10][3][11] the Shorter Oxford calls this sense now rare or obsolete.^[11] In 1847 it was used in architecture for a plinth or step above the cornice of the podium of ancient temples.^[10] The biological sense, the dissolution of cells, is from 1902, in the Journal of Experimental Medicine;^[10][7][9] it is especially used of the destruction of bacterial cells by bacteriophages,^[10][11] or of cells by a lysin.^[4]

Timeline

• 1543 – the gradual decline of a disease.^[3] The OED's first record of this sense is from 1834.^[10]
• 1847 – in architecture, a plinth above the cornice of a temple's podium.^[10]
• 1902 – the disintegration or dissolution of cells.^[10][7][9]

Meanings

Noun

1. (biology) The disintegration or dissolution of cells, as by a lysin or a virus that infects bacteria: The enzyme causes lysis of the red blood cells.^{[4][3][10][11]}
2. (medicine) The gradual easing of the symptoms of a disease, especially a slow fall in fever, as opposed to a crisis.^[4][3][10]
3. (architecture) A plinth or step above the cornice of the podium of an ancient temple.^[10]

Related words

• lyse
• -lysis
• lysin
• catalysis
• hydrolysis
• analysis
• lose

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press