Other

upsilon

Syllabification: (up·si·lon)

Definition of upsilon

noun

the twentieth letter of the Greek alphabet (Υ, υ), transliterated in the traditional Latin style as ‘y’ (as in cycle) or in the modern style as ‘u’ (as in the etymologies of this dictionary).
(Upsilon) [followed by Latin genitive] Astronomy the twentieth star in a constellation:Upsilon Scorpii
(also upsilon particle) Physics a meson thought to contain a b quark bound to its antiparticle, produced in particle accelerators.

Origin:

mid 17th century: Greek, literally 'plain or simple U', from psilos 'plain', referring to the need to distinguish upsilon from the diphthong oi: in late Greek the two had (and in modern Greek still have) the same pronunciation

upsilon in other Oxford dictionaries

Definition of upsilon in the British & World English dictionary

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