Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The thick semifluid mass of partly digested food that is passed from the stomach to the duodenum.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Food as it passes out of the stomach after gastric digestion, and before it has been acted on by the pancreatic, hepatic, and intestinal secretions.
  • An obsolete form of chime.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Physiol.) The pulpy mass of semi-digested food in the small intestines just after its passage from the stomach. It is separated in the intestines into chyle and excrement. See chyle.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The thick semifluid mass of partly digested food that is passed from the stomach to the duodenum.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a semiliquid mass of partially digested food that passes from the stomach through the pyloric sphincter into the duodenum

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English chime, humors, body fluids, from Old French, from Late Latin chȳmus, from Greek khūmos, juice; see gheu- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Late Latin chymus, from Ancient Greek χυμός (khumós, "juice").

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Examples

  • When food is introduced into the stomach, the peristaltic contractions of that organ roll it about, and mingle it with the gastric juice, which disintegrates the connective tissue, and converts the albuminous portions into the substance called chyme, which is about the consistency of pea-soup, and which is readily absorbed through the animal membranes into the blood of the delicate and numerous vessels of the stomach, whence it is conveyed to the portal vein and to the liver.

    The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English or, Medicine Simplified, 54th ed., One Million, Six Hundred and Fifty Thousand Ray Vaughn Pierce 1877

  • Food leaving the small intestine is called chyme, a semi-liquid mixture of fiber, undigested bits, indigestible bits, and the remains of digestive enzymes.

    How and When to Be Your Own Doctor Isabel Moser

  • After a variable time, from one to four hours, the contents of the stomach, which are now called chyme, begin to move on in successive portions into the next part of the intestinal canal.

    A Practical Physiology Albert F. Blaisdell

  • The food at this stage is called chyme; it is an acid and soup-like fluid -- acid through the influence of the gastric juice.

    Text Book of Biology, Part 1: Vertebrata 1906

  • I mean, they've done such a number on it that it's no longer food - it's called chyme, a partially digested semifluid mass that probably smells like what would come out of a dog if you fed it raw pork, bleach, and hot sauce.

    The Seventh Sense 2008

  • Once as much of the good stuff has been leeched out of the chyme as your system can do, the soup is passed on to the large intestine salmon colored in my cartoon.

    Evolution of the appendix? - The Panda's Thumb 2009

  • Then it's squirted into the small intestine colored orange, where the acids are first neutralized and more enzymes are tossed onto the watery, mushy soup that the food has been rendered down into, called chyme.

    Evolution of the appendix? - The Panda's Thumb 2009

  • The primary job of the small intestine is to suck all the nutrients out of the chyme and pass them on to the circulatory system.

    Evolution of the appendix? - The Panda's Thumb 2009

  • They are the muscles that are involved in the peristaltic action that moves the chyme through the intestinal tract by contracting and creating wave like motions.

    Muscles Part 3 2008

  • But they never make it better: it just discharges a whole load of putrid chyme, swells some more and hurts until it gets scratched again.

    Nurses for Reform Dan Vevers 2008

Comments

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  • They need a word for this? Except for sionnach's charming comment under chunder (hey, it rhymes!), I can't imagine why...

    December 29, 2007

  • There are so many fiiiiine words in this WeirdNet definition!

    December 29, 2007

  • It's one of those pretty words that has the talent to attract other pretty words. In 1828 Webster's:

    CHYME, n. That particular modification which food assumes after it has undergone the action of the stomach.

    Among the older authors, juice; chyle, or the finest part of the chyle contained in the lacteals and thoracic duct; any humor incrassated by concoction, whether fit or unfit for preserving and nourishing the body.

    December 29, 2007

  • Mmm. The finest part of the chyle; so much better than run-of-the-mill chyle, not to mention the dregs. (In fact, please don't mention the dregs.) And better still when properly incrassated with a little humor. Nourishing indeed for any body.

    Bilby, I think you should get some sort of award for posting that. You made my weekend, and it's only Saturday.

    December 30, 2007

  • No problem Asa, pleased to have incrassated you. After all 'twas just a snippet recalled from my chylehood.

    December 30, 2007

  • I remain puzzled about the etymology of rumchunder.

    December 30, 2007

  • Whenever I'm feeling perfectly fine, I can count on Wordie to make me feel nauseated. ;-)

    December 31, 2007

  • JM is so pleased when people don’t chyme in.

    June 22, 2009