Deinnervate

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To sever or disable the nerve supply that reaches a particular organ, muscle, or area of tissue so it no longer receives signals
2. Cutting off the nerves running to a body part, typically through surgery or medication, so that it loses sensation or the ability to respond
3. Removing or interrupting the neural connections serving a structure, leaving it unable to transmit or receive nervous impulses

Etymology: "Deinnervate" is a plain technical formation: the prefix "de-", meaning "removal" or "reversal" (from Latin "dē", "down, away from"), attached to "innervate." Innervate itself comes from the Latin "in-" ("into") and "nervus" ("sinew, nerve"), and in English it means to supply a body part with nerve impulses, or to stimulate it through the nerves. Adding "de-" reverses that: to cut off or remove the nerve supply to an organ, muscle or tissue. The word belongs to the vocabulary of physiology and medicine, where it is used in the sense of severing or interrupting nerve connections, often deliberately, as in surgery or experimental work. It is a coinage built on existing parts rather than a word with a long, shifting history, so its meaning is essentially the literal opposite of the root it grows from.

Synonyms: denervate

Antonyms: innervate