Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To stud with or as if with stars.
- n. A stage of an insect or other arthropod between molts.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To set or adorn with stars or with brilliants; star.
- To make a star of; set as a star.
- n. Any one of the periods of an insect's life between two molts. The period immediately after hatching is said to be the first instar, and that after the first molt the second instar. If a caterpillar molts four times the pupa is the sixth instar and the adult the seventh. The term originated with Fischer in 1853, but has only recently been generally adopted.
Wiktionary
- v. archaic To stud with stars.
- n. Any one of the several stages of postembryonic development which an arthropod undergoes, between molts, before it reaches sexual maturity.
- n. An arthropod at a specified one of these stages of development.
- n. by extension A stage in development.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. rare To stud as with stars.
- n. a postembryonic stage of life of an arthropod, especially an insect, between two successive molts; also, the arthropod when in that stage of life.
WordNet 3.0
- n. an insect or other arthropod between molts
Etymologies
- From Latin instar ("form, likeness"). (Wiktionary)
- New Latin īnstar, from Latin, image, form. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“[4] The convenient term 'instar' has been proposed by Fischer and advocated by Sharp (1895) for the form assumed by an insect during a stage of its life-story.”
“Cage experiments with first instar larvae and eggs.”
“With each instar the nymph becomes progressively more like an adult cockroach.”
“The period between each molt is known as an instar.”
“In the final nymphal instar, they construct an exit tunnel to the surface and emerge.”
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“You look at the maggots, and say things like "ah yes, that's a 2nd instar Protophormia terranovae, from which I deduce this man has been dead for between 32 and 43 hours.”
“As for pooping, the larva only poops once in its childhood, in that, the feces is stored at the end of the digestive tract as a superconcentrated pellet, and is only released after the molt of the second to final instar before pupating.”
“When these shots were taken, none had matured to the fifth instar stage of green and black bands with yellow spots along the black bands.”
“Fourth instar caterpillars look very different from the 2nd and 3rd instar.”
“Size range for 2nd instar is about 4.5 to 8 mm, for 3rd instar – 8mm to 13mm 1.3cm.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘instar’.
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Unsorted
poliorcetikon, lethologica, aegrotat, haha, logolepsy, logomisia, anfractuosity, nudiustertian, tontine, herostrat, acroamatic, bibliotaph and 132 more...
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summer words 2009
how many words can I make mine this summer?
largess, hoyden, catholic, fornicatress, quean, slattern, bildungsroman, sybaritic, descresent, nodus, frittle, callipygian and 529 more...
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bintalshamsa's list
My Favorite Words
weltschmerz, perspicacity, idée fixe, invigilator, salubrious, tchotchke, ex nihilo, invidious, malapropism, naïve, sardonic, elide and 1459 more...
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Words that were new to me
but now they're not because I looked them up. In cases of polysemy or homography, *of course* it was the oddest meaning that stumped me. ;)
Procrustean bed, idem sonans, hob, backcap, quango, cheap-jack, pantechnicon, churrigueresco, chopfallen, maritorious, supererogation, catimini and 212 more...
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Lolita
Words to remember from Nabokov's "Lolita"
concordance, limned, lurid, puerility, variorum, perspicacious, exigency, acrostic, solipsism, mnemosyne, involution, fatidic and 227 more...
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Lolita
Words compiled while reading Lolita
lolita, solecism, cognomen, etiolate, tendresse, expiatory, filch, paroxysm, arabesques, sibilant, manque, uranist and 181 more...
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Becoming Words
inchoateness
effervescent, albescent, concrescence, fervescent, frondescent, suffrutescent, violescent, viridescent, resipiscence, rufescent, sonorescent, tenebrescence and 131 more...
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Are we there yet?
These have some growing up to do.
colt, foal, kitten, cub, pup, heifer, larva, imago, veliger, trochophore, grub, maggot and 178 more...
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Speak, Memory
Words gathered while reading Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov.
cracknel, shingly, glaucous, stretcherman, goodish, loden, gutticle, percha, plasticine, instar, wellhole, camera-lucida and 357 more...
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I
impresario, indolent, indomitable, incipient, inimical, insouciance, instar, integument, internecine, interstice, inveterate, irenic and 29 more...
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All Manner of Lovely Insect Words
instar, ephemeroptera, pterostigma, hymenoptera, coleoptera, dictyoptera, hexapoda, orthoptera, phasmida, embioptera, diptera, lepidoptera and 8 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for instar.
fbharjo between molts - in formation Jan 27, 2008