upsilon
Americannoun
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the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet (Υ, υ).
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the vowel sound represented by this letter.
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Also called upsilon particle. Physics. any of a family of heavy, short-lived, neutral mesons that are composed of a bottom quark and its antiquark. Υ, υ
noun
Etymology
Origin of upsilon
First recorded in 1615–25; from Late Greek ŷ psīlón, literally, “simple u ” (to distinguish it from the digraph oi, pronounced the same in Late Greek )
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
And Last: The Empress comes down with a breakthrough case of the upsilon variant and loses her senses of taste and humor.
From Washington Post • Dec. 30, 2021
Alpha, beta, upsilon, phi / Tuition here is too damn high!
From Seattle Times • Dec. 26, 2019
Alpha, beta, upsilon, phi / Tuition here is too damn high!
From Washington Times • Dec. 26, 2019
They named the signal upsilon, after the shape of the decay-particle trajectories, which resembled the Greek letter.
From Nature • Nov. 4, 2018
Addition.—Out of the Greek i�ta, two; out of the Greek upsilon, four modifications have been evolved; viz., i and j out of ι, and u, v, w, y, out of υ. c.
From A Handbook of the English Language by Latham, R. G. (Robert Gordon)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.