verb · transitive · rare

metastasize

me·ta·stas·ize

metastasize · metastasizes · metastasized · metastasizing

metastasieren, absiedeln

Of a disease or a tumour: to form a metastasis inOf a disease (especially cancer) or a tumour: to form a metastasis (“a secondary focus away from the primary site”) in (a body organ).

UK/mɪˈtæstəsaɪz/US/məˈtæstəˌsaɪz/

Meaning

4 senses

(British, English, Oxford, US, specifically, transitive)Of a disease (especially cancer) or a tumour: to form a metastasis (“a secondary focus away from the primary site”) in (a body organ).
metastasieren, absiedeln
(British, English, Oxford, US, figuratively, transitive)To disseminate or spread (something, often an undesirable thing), especially in a destructive manner.
(British, English, Oxford, US, intransitive, specifically)Of a disease (especially cancer) or a tumour: to undergo metastasis (“spreading from a primary site to one or more other sites in the body”).
(British, English, Oxford, US, figuratively, intransitive)Of a thing, often one which is undesirable: to disseminate or spread, especially in a destructive manner.

More definitions

spread throughout the body

Translations

5 languages

Deutsch

By meaning 1

(transitive) of a disease (especially cancer) or a tumour: to form a metastasis in (a body organ); (intransitive) to undergo metastasis:

Origin

From metastasis + -ize (suffix forming verbs meaning to do things denoted by the adjective

From metastasis + -ize (suffix forming verbs meaning to do things denoted by the adjectives or nouns the suffix is attached to). Metastasis is a learned borrowing from Late Latin metastasis (“(rhetoric) rapid or sudden transition from one argument, point, or topic to another”), and from its etymons Koine Greek μετάστασις (metástasis, “(rhetoric) rapid or sudden transition from one argument, point, or topic to another”) and Ancient Greek μετάστασις (metástasis, “change; removal; (medicine) movement of disease, pain, etc., from one part of the body to another”), from μετᾰ- (metă-, prefix denoting change in condition or position) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *meth₂) + στᾰ́σῐς (stắsĭs, “condition, state; position”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand (up)”)), modelled after μεθιστάναι (methistánai, “to change; to remove”).

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Forms

metastasizes, metastasizing, metastasized, metastasized

Base form	metastasize · to metastasize
3rd person singular	metastasizes
Present participle	metastasizing
Past simple	metastasized
Past participle	metastasized