Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The chemical processes occurring within a living cell or organism that are necessary for the maintenance of life. In metabolism some substances are broken down to yield energy for vital processes while other substances, necessary for life, are synthesized.
- n. The processing of a specific substance within the living body: water metabolism; iodine metabolism.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In theology, the consensus of views of some of the early fathers in regard to the eucharist, favoring an objective union of the sensible with the supersensible, or the real with the symbolical presence.
- n. In poetry, a change from one meter into another.
- n. In entomology, metamorphosis; transformation; metaboly; transition from larva to pupa, or from pupa to imago.
- n. In biology: The sum of the chemical changes within the body, or within any single cell of the body, by which the protoplasm is either renewed or changed to perform special functions, or else disorganized and prepared for excretion. Thus, the formation of the colorless blood-corpuscles, the elaboration of the digestive ferments, and the breaking up of proteids into urea and other products are examples of metabolism. Compare anabolism, catabolism.
- n. Especially, retrograde metamorphosis; catabolism.
Wiktionary
- n. physiology The complete set of chemical reactions that occur in living cells.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Physiol.) The act or process, by which living tissues or cells take up and convert into their own proper substance the nutritive material brought to them by the blood, or by which they transform their cell protoplasm into simpler substances, which are fitted either for excretion or for some special purpose, as in the manufacture of the digestive enzymes. Hence, metabolism may be either constructive (anabolism), or destructive (catabolism).
- n. (Biol.) The series of chemical changes which take place in an organism, by means of which food is manufactured and utilized and waste materials are eliminated.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the organic processes (in a cell or organism) that are necessary for life
- n. the marked and rapid transformation of a larva into an adult that occurs in some animals
Etymologies
- From Ancient Greek μεταβολή (metabolē, "change"), from μετά ("meta-") + βάλλω (ballō, "I throw"). (Wiktionary)
- From Greek metabolē, change, from metaballein, to change : meta-, meta- + ballein, to throw; see gwelə- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Their metabolism is way down so they go slow and eat small things.”
“Clearance of drugs with a low rate of hepatic extraction is especially dependent on the rate of liver metabolism. 7 Drugs which have low intrinsic clearance rates will have a corresponding decrease in metabolism with decreased hepatic function. 7 Clearance of drugs with a high rate of hepatic extraction will be mostly dependent on the rate of hepatic blood flow. 7 This can be diminished, as mentioned earlier, making these drugs more bioavailable.”
“When you then get down to a lower weight, the damage to metabolism is still there, invisible, affecting all your efforts to control your weight.”
Dr. Sharma’s Obesity Notes » Blog Archive » Weight Acceptance Prevents Weight Gain?
“There is a whole host of other physiological responses" to exercise, such as heart rate, cholesterol levels, blood pressure and insulin metabolism, that are related to genes other than those implicated in the aerobic response, says co-author Tuomo Rankinen, a scientist in the human genomics laboratory at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge.”
“In recent photos (like this one) she looks painfully underweight, but I'm hoping that's just how her metabolism is rather than any digestive issues or eating disorder.”
“During the 1930s, Kuhn's research on vitamins as growth factors and enzymatic reactions in metabolism brought him work as an advisor and collaborator at I.G. Farben, the large German chemical company.”
Richard Kuhn and the Chemical Institute: Double Bonds and Biological Mechanisms
“By driving fat accumulation, carbohydrates also increase hunger and decrease the amount of energy we expend in metabolism and physical activity.”
“Trout seem to be really hungry because their metabolism is high and little food.”
“Intestinal and hepatic lipoprotein metabolism in hyperlipidemia”
“Fluoride ions bind with calcium and magnesium to form insoluble salts which produce cell death and necrosis as cellular metabolism is disrupted.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘metabolism’.
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BIOL - the brain
tumor, retina, tremor, arousal, clot, ruptured blood ve..., pressure on a blo..., brain region, comprehension of ..., production of mea..., autonomic nervous..., conservation of t... and 564 more...
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ficciones's list
encyclopedic
imbroglio, splendour, brilliance, labyrinth, vast, precipice, ebb and flow, tidal, crevasse, resonate, redolent, prudent and 55 more...
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science (collective opinion)
random scientific terms from a group of one hundred 16-18 year olds to choose 100 words that, in their collective opinion, represent crucial factors and concepts influencing trends in science today...
acid, base, aggregation status, analysis, antimatter, apparatus, atmosphere, atom, bacteria, Big Bang, biodiversity, bioethics and 90 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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fbharjo's Words
jumelle, kef, kenspeckle, lautitious, essentic, pilpulistic, impavid, cicurant, clou, chrysostomic, miasma, teleology and 1625 more...
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Lesson 1
abroad, abrupt, acceptable, acclaim, actually, apparently, primitive, metabolism, insulate, assemble, adverse, advice and 8 more...
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carlc's Words
lexicon, tessalate, praxis, relevance, systems thinking, relationship, space, resonate, flow, emergence, autopoeisis, cause and 17 more...
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practice test 1
compound word, semantic, root, radical, coinage, denote, connote, lionization, caprice, equivocal, subcutaneous, metabolism and 68 more...
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brian's Words
hijinks, akimbo, plethora, accoutrements, redivider, informatician, raccoonnookkeeper, jowl, qaanaaq, sawdust, maniacal, copious and 34 more...
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Literarie: The Quiet Girl
A novel by Peter Høeg.
sconce, furniture, ostinato, quack grass, child-molester ch..., blonde, granite, angst, dissolve, security, pentatonic, metabolism and 33 more...
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Words and life
Developing word understanding
logic, reason, rationale, faith, persuasion, attribute, system, power, principality, perception, behavior, interaction and 62 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for metabolism.
bilby "He parked where the fire road turned off. Already the ground frost was so thick he could feel the cold through the soles of his shoes. The girl must have a different metabolism from him; in her thin sweater she seemed to be carrying summer around with her."
- 'The Quiet Girl', Peter Høeg. Mar 18, 2008
jeen0809 The human body is subject to metabolism. Mar 14, 2007