Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An early embryonic form produced by cleavage of a fertilized ovum and consisting of a spherical layer of cells surrounding a fluid-filled cavity.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In embryology: An embryo of one of the Metazoa, in the stage in which it consists of a sac formed of a single layer of cells.
  • noun In Haeckel′ s vocabulary of embryology, same as blastosphere, .

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Biol.) That stage in the development of the ovum in which the outer cells of the morula become more defined and form the blastoderm.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun embryology An early form in the development of an embryo, consisting of a spherical layer of cells filled with fluid; a blastosphere.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun early stage of an embryo produced by cleavage of an ovum; a liquid-filled sphere whose wall is composed of a single layer of cells; during this stage (about eight days after fertilization) implantation in the wall of the uterus occurs

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[New Latin : from Greek blastos, bud + Latin -ula, feminine diminutive suff.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From New Latin, diminutive of Ancient Greek βλαστός (blastos, "a germ, bud, sprout, shoot"), from βλαστάνειν (blastanein, "to bud, sprout, grow, properly of plants, but also of animals").

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Examples

  • It’s not a solid ball but a hollow one, and it is called the blastula.

    THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH RICHARD DAWKINS 2009

  • It’s not a solid ball but a hollow one, and it is called the blastula.

    THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH RICHARD DAWKINS 2009

  • The only people politicizing the use of embryonic stem cells are those who claim that a blastula, which is an invisible to the naked eye group of cells an embryo is not the same thing as a fetus, is a human.

    Think Progress » Michael J. Fox: ‘I Could Give a Damn About Rush Limbaugh’s Pity…I’m Not A Victim’ 2006

  • The globular wall of the blastula is a real blastoderm, and consists of homogeneous (blastodermic) cells; it is not yet differentiated into the two primary germinal layers.

    The Evolution of Man — Volume 1 Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel 1876

  • After the egg is fertilized it becomes a blastula, which is free swimming.

    CreationWiki - Recent changes [en] 2010

  • The development of most animals is characterized by distinctive stages, including a zygote, formed by the product of the first few division of cells following fertilization; a blastula, which is a hollow ball of cells formed by the developing zygote; and a gastrula, which is formed when the blastula folds in on itself to form a double-walled structure with an opening to the outside, the

    Conservapedia - Recent changes [en] TK 2010

  • The development of most animals is characterized by distinctive stages, including a zygote, formed by the product of the first few division of cells following fertilization; a blastula, which is a hollow ball of cells formed by the developing zygote; and a gastrula, which is formed when the blastula folds in on itself to form a double-walled structure with an opening to the outside, the

    Conservapedia - Recent changes [en] 2010

  • After the egg is fertilized it becomes a blastula, which is free swimming.

    CreationWiki - Recent changes [en] 2010

  • After the egg is fertilized it becomes a blastula, which is free swimming.

    CreationWiki - Recent changes [en] 2009

  • After the egg is fertilized it becomes a blastula, which is free swimming.

    CreationWiki - Recent changes [en] 2009

Comments

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  • "Empty of everything, in a hum of sempiternal readiness for that soul-wilting, muse-recoiling Jawohl, Herr Kommandant! to shoot up one’s spinal column as quick as a blastula ..." from John Latta's Isola di Rifiuti

    August 3, 2007

  • "When you’re twisting balloons for children, never tell them what you’re making. The majority of the finished products—despite your best attempts—almost always look like a dog, a blastula, or something vaguely phallic. If you identify what you’re actually attempting to make, the children will respond to your finished product with, 'That doesn’t look like a insert animal name…' But if you make the animals and then ask, 'What does it look like to you?' the child’s imagination will take over, turning the blue, four-legged balloon into Blue from Blue’s Clues, the blastula into a Pokemon, and the phallic object into an elephant. You’ll also get bonus points because you were so cool for making exactly what they wanted."

    - 'Tricks Of The Trade', Matthew Baldwin, 22 Dec 2007.

    December 23, 2007