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second messenger

American

noun

Biochemistry.

any of various intracellular chemical substances, as cyclic AMP, that transmit and amplify the messages delivered by a first messenger to specific receptors on the cell surface.

second messenger Cultural

A molecule that relays messages in a cell from a receptor on a cell membrane to the final destination where an action within the cell is to take place. (See signal transduction pathway.)

Etymology

Origin of second messenger

First recorded in 1960–65

Example Sentences

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second messenger

Calcium ion is a widely used second messenger.

From Textbooks ● Jun. 9, 2022

Therefore, they do not directly affect the transcription of target genes, but instead initiate a signaling cascade that is carried out by a molecule called a second messenger.

From Textbooks ● Jun. 19, 2013

This intracellular mediator is called the second messenger.

From Textbooks ● Jun. 19, 2013

I have sent a messenger and later I have even sent a second messenger, urging the bandits to send a competent agent to expedite our negotiations for the liberation of Mrs. Pawley and Mr. Corkran.

From Time Magazine Archive

And he thought, with a grim satisfaction, of the note he had just confided to the Premier's second messenger refusing the offer of the Attorney-Generalship.

From The Testing of Diana Mallory by Mrs. Humphry Ward

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023