Definitions

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

  • noun The rhythmic contraction of the heart, especially of the ventricles, by which blood is driven through the aorta and pulmonary artery after each dilation or diastole.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In anc. orthoëpy and prosody: Pronunciation of a vowel as short.
  • noun The shortening of a vowel or syllable, especially of one usually treated as a long; correption: opposed to diastole or ectasis.
  • noun In physiology, the contraction of the heart and arteries for propelling the blood and thus carrying on the circulation.
  • noun The contraction of the pulsatile vesicles of infusorians and other protozoans.
  • noun [capitalized] In entomology, a genus of hymenopterous insects.

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

  • noun (Gram.) The shortening of the long syllable.
  • noun (Physiol. & Biol.) The contraction of the heart and arteries by which the blood is forced onward and the circulation kept up; also, the contraction of a rhythmically pulsating contractile vacuole; -- correlative to diastole.

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

  • noun physiology The rhythmic contraction of the heart, by which blood is driven through the arteries.
  • noun prosody A shortening of a naturally long vowel.

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

  • noun the contraction of the chambers of the heart (especially the ventricles) to drive blood into the aorta and pulmonary artery

Etymologies

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

[Greek sustolē, contraction, from sustellein, to contract; see systaltic.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From New Latin, from Ancient Greek συστολή (sustolē), from συστέλλειν (sustellein, "to contract"), from σύν (sun, "together") + στέλλειν (stellein, "send").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word systole.

Examples

  • The interpretation that the P-peak belongs to the auricular systole is mainly based on his observation of electrocardiograms in cases of heart block in patients or during vagus stimulation in dogs.

    Physiology or Medicine 1924 - Presentation Speech 1965

  • The words "systole" - usually used to refer to ventricular systole, the phase of your cardiac cycle where your ventricles, the big chambers, are contracting to eject blood - and

    WordPress.com News draust 2008

  • There were all sorts of speculations about the matter, but nobody had formed this conception, and nobody understood that the so-called systole of the heart is a state of active contraction, and the so-called diastole is a mere passive dilatation.

    Essays 2007

  • There were all sorts of speculations about the matter, but nobody had formed this conception, and nobody understood that the so-called systole of the heart is a state of active contraction, and the so-called diastole is a mere passive dilatation.

    Lectures and Essays Thomas Henry Huxley 1860

  • The blood, however, does not flow out of the heart into the arteries in a continued stream, but by jets, or pulses; when the ventricles are filled with blood from the auricles, this blood stimulates them, and thereby causes them to contract; by such contraction, they force the blood, which they contain, into the arteries; this contraction is called the systole of the heart.

    Popular Lectures on Zoonomia Or The Laws of Animal Life, in Health and Disease Thomas Garnett 1784

  • He thought that both the contractions and dilatations of the heart -- what we call the 'systole' or contraction of the heart, and the 'diastole' or dilatation -- Galen thought that these were both active movements; that the heart actively dilated, so that it had a sort of sucking power upon the fluids which had access to it.

    Lectures and Essays Thomas Henry Huxley 1860

  • "systole" (compare Section 44), forcing out of its body, the water, carbon dioxide, urea, and other katastases, which are formed concomitantly with its activity.

    Text Book of Biology, Part 1: Vertebrata 1906

  • Diastole and systole, diastole and systole, not arrhythmia.

    Distracted Much? Don’t Worry, It’s A Good Thing | Lifehacker Australia 2009

  • Diastole and systole, diastole and systole, not arrhythmia.

    Distracted Much? Don’t Worry, It’s A Good Thing | Lifehacker Australia 2009

  • But he argues that the West, far from a monolithic bulwark against "diversity," is "the mongrel civilization par excellence"; the systole and diastole of contractive monoculturalism and expansive multiculturalism are its heartbeat.

    A Real-Life Renaissance Man 2008

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • JM wonders where the missing bits of systoles end up?

    March 24, 2011