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A.Word.A.Day--idiopathy

(id-ee-OP-uh-thee)

noun: A disease of unknown origin or one having no apparent cause.

[From New Latin idiopathia (primary disease), from Greek idiopatheia, from idios (one's own, personal) + -pathy (feeling, suffering).]

"Beneath the complexity and idiopathy of every cancer lies a limited number of 'mission critical' events that have propelled the tumour cell and its progeny into uncontrolled expansion and invasion."
Gerald I Evan and Karen H Vousden; Proliferation, Cell Cycle And Apoptosis^* in Cancer; Nature (London, UK); May 17, 2001.

^*Apoptosis: a cell's death by suicide, also known as Programmed Cell Death (PCD).

See more usage examples of idiopathy in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

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