lenticel

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From New Latin lenticella, diminutive of Latin lēns (“lentil”); compare French lenticelle.[1]

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈlɛntɪsɛl/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • (weak vowel merger) IPA(key): /ˈlɛntəsɛl/

Noun

lenticel (plural lenticels)

  1. One of the small, oval, rounded spots upon the stem or branch of a plant, from which the underlying tissues may protrude or roots may issue, either in the air, or more commonly when the stem or branch is covered with water or earth.
    • 2024, Sarah Brooks, The Cautious Traveller’s Guide to the Wastelands, Wiedenfeld & Nicolson, page 89:
      He raises his binocular telescope, bringing the birches near the shoreline into sharp relief, the eye-shaped lenticels in the pale bark seeming to stare back at him, as if following the train’s progress.
  2. A small, lens-shaped gland on the underside of some leaves.

Derived terms

References

  1. ^ “lenticel, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “lenticel”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Anagrams

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