胰 (yí): pancreas

Measure Word

一个胰 gè

Meanings

1 pancreas

Characters

胰

yí

pancreas

Examples

胰负责分泌胰岛素来调节血糖。

Yí fùzé fēnmì yídǎosù lái tiáojié xuètáng.

The pancreas is responsible for secreting insulin to regulate blood sugar.

医生说他的胰出现了炎症。

Yīshēng shuō tā de yí chūxiàn le yánzhèng.

The doctor said his pancreas was inflamed.

胰腺癌是一种难以早期发现的疾病。

Yíxiàn ái shì yī zhǒng nányǐ zǎoqī fāxiàn de jíbìng.

Pancreatic cancer is a disease that is difficult to detect early.

Tips

usage

胰 alone refers to the pancreas organ, but in common usage it more often appears in compounds: 胰腺 (yíxiàn, pancreas), 胰岛素 (yídǎosù, insulin), 胰液 (yíyè, pancreatic juice).

Components

radical

⺼ ròu

flesh (radical form of 肉)

Left-side flesh radical — the side form of 肉, visually identical to 月 (moon) but semantically distinct. Indexes 胰 in the body-organ family alongside 脏 organs, 胃 stomach, 肝 liver. Carries the meaning: the pancreas is an internal soft-tissue organ, and the meat radical marks it as one of the body's glands.

phonetic

夷 yí

level; barbarian (here phonetic)

Right side 夷 supplies the sound directly — yí to yí, identical. 夷 originally pictured a person bent over a bow, classically used for eastern foreign tribes and the verbal sense to flatten — none of which transfers here. Borrowed purely as a sound match. 胰 is mostly a modern medical-anatomy term.