The principal protein of maize, used in the manufacture of fibres, coatings, and polymers, and also to glaze and coat foods such as confectionery, nuts, and meat. In later use also (as a count noun): any of the proteins of the prolamine class of which this material consists.
1820
This substance I shall call zeïne, not from any wish to multiply vegetable principles, nor because I think it of any importance, but merely that it may be definitely described and designated without circumlocution.
J. Gorham in New Eng. Journal Med. & Surgeryvol. 9 324
1822
The zëine of John Gorham, is obtained from Indian corn, by infusing it in water.
Quarterly Journal Science, Literature, & Arts July 402
1877
Zein,..a nitrogenous substance obtained from maize-flour.
H. Watts, Dictionary of Chemistryvol. V. 1066
1919
A desperate attempt was made to substitute maize for wheat, because it contained 5 to 7 per cent. of protein—called zein—a perfectly good protein in the books and in the laboratories.
W. Hutchinson, Doctor in War iii. 42
1976
A low-quality or nutritionally ‘incomplete’ protein such as the zein of corn, which lacks the amino acids tryptophan and lysine, cannot support either maintenance or growth.
Scientific American September 59/1
1989
Zeins, the prolamins of maize, are a group of highly hydrophobic storage proteins..that constitute 50% to 60% of the total protein in the endosperm of the kernel.
Journal of Heredityvol. 80 17/1
2008
Development of economical methods for extraction of zein and formulation of products is an area of active research.
N. N. Nichols & R. J. Bothast in W. Vermerris, Genetic Improvem. Bioenergy Crops iii. 84
Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛtl/ but /ˈpɛtl̩i/.
Vowels
iːfleece
ihappy
ɪkit
ɛdress
atrap, bath
ɑːstart, palm, bath
ɒlot
ɔːthought, force
ʌstrut
ʊfoot
uːgoose
əletter
əːnurse
ɪənear
ɛːsquare
ʊəcure
eɪface
ʌɪpride
aʊmouth
əʊgoat
ɔɪvoice
ãgratin
ɒ̃salon
ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)
Other symbols
The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.
Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛd(ə)l/ but /ˈpɛdl̩i/.
Vowels
ifleece, happy
ɪkit
ɛdress
ætrap, bath
ɑlot, palm, cloth, thought
ɑrstart
ɔcloth, thought
ɔrnorth, force
ʊfoot
ugoose
əstrut, comma
ərnurse, letter
ɪ(ə)rnear
ɛ(ə)rsquare
ʊ(ə)rcure
eɪface
aɪpride
aʊmouth
oʊgoat
ɔɪvoice
ɑ̃gratin
æ̃salon
ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)
Other symbols
The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.
Simple text respell breaks words into syllables, separated by a hyphen. The syllable which carries the primary stress is written in capital letters. This key covers both British and U.S. English Simple Text Respell.
Consonants
b, d, f, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w and z have their standard English values
gguy
jjay
yyore
chchore
khloch
shshore
ththaw
dhthee
zhbeige
Vowels
atrap
ahpalm
airsquare
arstart
arrcarry (British only)
awthought
ayface
a(ng)gratin
edress
eefleece
eerdeer
errmerry
ikit
ighpride
irrmirror
olot (British only)
ohgoat
oogoose
oorcure
orforce
orrsorry (British only)
owmouth
oyvoice
o(ng)salon
ustrut
uhletter
urnurse
urrhurry
uufoot
Forms
Variant forms
α.
1800s
zëine, zeïne
1800s–1900s
zeine
β.
1800s–
zein
Frequency
zein typically occurs about 0.08 times per million words in modern written English.
zein is in frequency band 3, which contains words occurring between 0.01 and 0.1 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands
Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.
Frequency of zein, n., 1820–2010
* Occurrences per million words in written English
Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.
The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.
For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.
Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.