Cytosols

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Aqueous component of the cytoplasm in which organelles are suspended and metabolic processes occur
2. Intracellular fluid that provides a medium for biochemical reactions and contains various solutes, proteins, and ions
3. The fluid part of the cell's cytoplasm, essential for maintaining cell shape and facilitating the transport of substances within the cell

Etymology: Cytosol is a modern scientific coinage, built from two pieces with quite different histories. The first piece, "cyto-", comes from the Ancient Greek "kútos", meaning a hollow vessel or container, and reached English as a combining form for cells. The second piece, "sol", is a clipped form of "solution", which passed into English through Old French "solucion" and Latin "solūtiō", from "solvō", "to loosen or dissolve." The Greek and Latin roots were therefore never used together by ancient writers; the compound was assembled in modern scientific English, when biologists needed a name for the watery medium inside cells. Cytosols is simply the plural of cytosol, used when discussing several distinct cellular fluids or the cytosol of different cells. Its meaning follows the pattern of its parts: a "solution" that fills the cell's "container," so the word describes the liquid space in which the cell's contents float and move.

Synonyms: cytoplasm, cell fluid, intracellular fluid