Pedicle
noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A fleshy line used to attach and anchor brachiopods and some bivalve molluscs to a substrate.
"A species of shell-fish, often found sticking by its pedicle to the bottom of ships, doing no other injury than deadening the way a little: "Barnacles, termed soland geese In th' islands of the Orcades.""
- 2 a small stalk bearing a single flower of an inflorescence; an ultimate division of a common peduncle wordnet
- 3 The attachment point for antlers in cervids.
"His long, rakish horns are mounted on a pedicle that extends above his head, thus accentuating the droll length of his features."
- 4 A stalk that attaches a tumour to normal tissue
"--Figure 3. Fig. 4, Plate 58, represents the neck of the bladder and neighbouring part of the urethra of an ox, in which a polypous growth is seen attached by a long pedicle to the veru montanum and blocking up the neck of the bladder."
- 5 pedicel (any sense)
"One of the ends is lengthened out into a neck or pedicle, which is as long as the egg proper."
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- 6 peduncle (any sense)
"The chimpanzee Heschl's gyrus homolog also showed evidence of a strongly excavated middle Heschl's sulcus, within the confines of a single gyral pedicle, predominantly in the right hemisphere."
- 7 Part of a skin or tissue graft temporarily left attached to its original site.
- 8 A fetter for the foot.
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"A species of shell-fish, often found sticking by its pedicle to the bottom of ships, doing no other injury than deadening the way a little: "Barnacles, termed soland geese In th' islands of the Orcades.""
Etymology
From Latin pedīculus (“little foot”), diminutive of pēs.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.