Science & TechnologyGreek → English
Glycolysis
/ɡlaɪˈkɑlɪsɪs/noun
The ten-step pathway that splits glucose to pyruvate and yields a small amount of usable energy without oxygen.
The Greek roots
γλυκύς
glykýs
sweet
λύσις
lýsis
loosening, breaking apart
Literally: “sugar loosening”
The story of the word
Working out the ten steps took German and Polish biochemists most of the first half of the twentieth century, and the pathway still carries three of their names as Embden-Meyerhof-Parnas. It runs in nearly everything alive, which is one of the arguments that it is very old. λύσις, a loosening, is the same word that gives analysis, taking a problem apart, and paralysis, a loosening at the side.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- late 19th century
Same family
glycogenglucoseanalysisparalysis
In a sentence
A sprinter runs on glycolysis; a marathoner cannot.
Yeast finishes glycolysis and then makes alcohol out of the pyruvate.