noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   The disaccharide sugar of milk and dairy products, C₁₂H₂₂O₁₁, a product of glucose and galactose used as a food and in medicinal compounds. countable, uncountable
2. 2
   a sugar comprising one glucose molecule linked to a galactose molecule; occurs only in milk wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

milk sugarcarbohydratelactobioselactobiose

Example

More examples

"Many Asians are lactose intolerant."

Etymology

Borrowed from French lactose, from Latin lac (“milk”) + -ose (derivation of glucose). Coined by French chemist Marcelin Berthelot.

Related phrases

lactose intolerancelactose intolerantlactose-freelactose-negativelactose-positive

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.