Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Glia
/ˈɡlaɪə/noun
The non-neuronal cells of the nervous system, which support, insulate and regulate neurons.
The Greek roots
γλία
glía
glue
Literally: “glue”
Follow a root:γλία1 word
The story of the word
Virchow called the material between neurons Nervenkitt, nerve-putty, in 1856, and the Latinized neuroglia, nerve-glue, came from him as well. The name froze an assumption into the language: that these cells were packing, holding the important cells in position. Glia turn out to prune synapses, control blood flow and pass signals of their own, so the glue has been promoted to part of the machine.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → German → English
Same family
neurogliagliomagluten
In a sentence
A glioma is a tumour of the glia rather than of the neurons.
Half the brain by cell count is glia, and for a century almost nobody studied them.