elater
English
Etymology 1
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ɪˈleɪ.tə/
- (General American) IPA(key): /əˈleɪ.tɚ/
- Rhymes: -eɪtə(ɹ)
Noun
elater (plural elaters)
- That which elates.
Etymology 2
From New Latin elatēr, from Ancient Greek ἐλατήρ (elatḗr, “driver, that which drives away”).
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈɛl.ə.tə/
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈɛl.ə.tɚ/
Noun
elater (plural elaters)
- (obsolete) Elasticity; especially the expansibility of a gas.
- (botany) A long, slender cell produced among spores and having hygroscopic secondary cell wall thickenings.
- 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page 4:
- The closest affinities of the Jubulaceae are with the Lejeuneaceae. The two families share in common: (a) elaters usually 1-spiral, trumpet-shaped and fixed to the capsule valves, distally […]
- (botany) Any of the long, slender hygroscopic appendages attached to the spores of horsetails (genus Equisetum).
- (zoology) An elaterid, or click beetle.
Derived terms
- pseudoelater
References
- William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “elater”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.