pseudopodium

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A pseudopod.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. In Protozoa, as pseudopods, rhizopods, or myxopods, a temporary diversiform prolongation or protrusion of the sarcode or body-substance of the animalcule, to any extent or in any shape, capable of being withdrawn or reabsorbed into the general mass of the body, and serving as an organ of locomotion, prehension, or ingestion; a pseudopod, or false foot: generally in the plural. The term is very comprehensive in its application to foot-like, finger-like, or ray-like processes of the body of protozoans; but it is the essential character of a pseudopodium to be soft, diversiform, or variable in shape, and temporary, or subject to reabsorption—in which respects the organ differs from the fixed or constant processes of many protozoans, as cilia or fiagella. Pseudopodia are highly characteristic of the lower or non-corticate protozoans, the myxopods or rhizopods proper, as all the amœbiforms, the heliozoans, the foraminifers, etc. They may be broad and lobate processes of sarcode, or slender filamentous rays. When lobate the pseudopodia remain distinct from one another, their margins are clear and transparent, and the granules which they may contain plainly flow into their interior from the more fluid central part of the body; or the whole body of the animalcule may flow into such a pseudopod, thus effecting a peculiar kind of locomotion. But when they are filiform they are very apt to run into one another, and give rise to networks, the constituent filaments of which, however, readily separate and regain their previous form; and, whether they do this or not, the surfaces of these pseudopodia are beset by minute granules, which are in incessant motion. See cuts under Actinosphærium, Amœba, and Rotalia.
2. n. In Rotifera, the aboral region, caudal extremity, or tail-end of a wheel-animalcule. It varies much in size, form, and function, and may be absent. When best developed, it is a considerable muscular organ, serving as a sucker-like means of attachment or as a fin-like organ for swimming. It is sometimes a pair of tails, like styles or flaps.
3. n. In botany: In Musci, a false pedicel, or elongation of the extremity of a branch of the oöphyte, in the form of stalk, supporting a sporogonium or capsule.
4. n. In Mycetozoa, a protrusion of the protoplasm of an amœboid body, which may be drawn in, or into which the whole body may move.

Wiktionary

1. n. cytology pseudopod

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Same as pseudopod.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. temporary outgrowth used by some microorganisms as an organ of feeding or locomotion