Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Biochemistry The dissolution or destruction of cells, such as blood cells or bacteria, as by the action of a specific lysin that disrupts the cell membrane.
  • noun Medicine The gradual subsiding of the symptoms of an acute disease.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The dissolution of various cells by means of lysins.
  • noun In medicine, the gradual recession of a disease, as distinguished from crisis, in which the change for the better is more abrupt.
  • noun In architecture, a plinth or step above the cornice of the podium of some Roman temples. When present in a columnar edifice, it constitutes the stylobate proper.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Med.) The resolution or favorable termination of a disease, coming on gradually and not marked by abrupt change.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun medicine, pathology A gradual recovery from disease (opposed to crisis).
  • noun biochemistry The disintegration or destruction of cells

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun recuperation in which the symptoms of an acute disease gradually subside
  • noun (biochemistry) dissolution or destruction of cells such as blood cells or bacteria

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[New Latin, from Latin, a loosening, from Greek lusis, from lūein, to loosen; see leu- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the Latin lysis, from the Ancient Greek λύσις ("a loosening"); compare -lysis.

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Examples

  • Lysostaphin works by first attaching itself to the bacterial cell wall and then slicing open the cell wall (the enzyme's name derives from the Greek "lysis" meaning "to loosen or release").

    innovations-report 2010

  • To study viral infections, Weitz teamed with postdoctoral fellow Yuriy Mileyko, graduate student Richard Joh and Eberhard Voit, who is a professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, the David D. Flanagan Chair Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in Biological Systems and director of the new Integrative BioSystems Institute at Georgia Tech. Nearly all previous theoretical studies have claimed that switching between "lysis" and

    innovations-report 2008

  • Daptomycin exerts bactericidal activity without lysis of Staphylococcus aureus.

    SUPERBUG MARYN MCKENNA 2010

  • Daptomycin exerts bactericidal activity without lysis of Staphylococcus aureus.

    SUPERBUG MARYN MCKENNA 2010

  • Daptomycin exerts bactericidal activity without lysis of Staphylococcus aureus.

    SUPERBUG MARYN MCKENNA 2010

  • For example, the dissolved organic matter absorbed by a bacterium is likely a mixture of that excreted by a primary producer and some from the viral lysis of another bacterium as well the excreta of yet another organism that fed on a herbivore or a primary producer.

    Marine microbes 2009

  • Lytic (or virulent) viruses infect a cell (or tissue), replicate (i.e. make new viruses) and are released by lysis the host cell.

    Marine viruses 2007

  • In this scenario, once a microbe becomes dominant, the increase in abundance increases its contacts with viruses leading to significant increases in infection and subsequent lysis, which then control its abundance.

    Marine viruses 2007

  • These organically-complexed nutrients released to the marine community during virus lysis therefore need to be assimilated into cells by different biochemical pathways than those released during the remineralization of organic material.

    Marine viruses 2007

  • From observations in lab studies, it appears that these cyanophage-encoded photosynthesis genes force the infected host cell to continue with photosynthesis until shortly before cell lysis.

    Marine viruses 2007

Comments

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  • as opposed to crisis.

    July 22, 2008

  • Plinth!

    April 5, 2011