Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Botany The part of a plant embryo that develops into a root.
- n. Anatomy A small structure, such as a fibril of a nerve, that resembles a root.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In botany:
- n. A rootlet: same as radicel.
- n. Specifically, same as caulicle: by late writers appropriately restricted to the rudimentary root at the lower extremity of the caulicle.
- n. In anatomy and zoology, a little root or root-like part; a radix: as, the radicles of a vein (the minute vessels which unite to form a vein); the radicle of a nerve.
- n. In philology, same as radical, 1.
- n. In chem., same as radical, 2.
- n. In the graptolites, the proximal extension of the virgula.
Wiktionary
- n. botany The rudimentary shoot of a plant which supports the cotyledons in the seed, and from which the root is developed downward; the root of the embryo.
- n. botany A rootlet.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The rudimentary stem of a plant which supports the cotyledons in the seed, and from which the root is developed downward; the stem of the embryo; the caulicle.
- n. A rootlet; a radicel.
WordNet 3.0
- n. (anatomy) a small structure resembling a rootlet (such as a fibril of a nerve)
Etymologies
- From Latin radicula. (Wiktionary)
- Latin rādīcula, diminutive of rādīx, rādīc-, root; see wrād- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The round pointed projection was formerly called the radicle, but is now spoken of as the hypocotyl, because it grows below or under the cotyledons.”
“The tip of the radicle is a kind of brain to the whole growing part of the radicle!”
“Does that make me some kind of radicle denialist, sort of like your AAGW label?”
“This ridiculous "radicle" rant reveals its own radical irrelevance.”
“The strangest thing is that though her book focuses on the United States and seemingly ‘radicle’ right wingers I can see the things that she talks about.”
“I know, for those of you on the left this is probably one of the most radicle things you will ever hear and right now every fibre of your being is most likely being challenged. take a seat, have a drink of water but do us all a favour and engage your brain before you demand America cuts aid to Israel.”
On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with...
“They are probably the most influential radicle Islam nation that is one of bush/carlyle groups best friends …”
“While I think that we should have used Iraq to help us attack iran and befriended saddam because he was not so radicle.”
Think Progress » Retired generals call Iran war ‘disastrous.’
“In the plant, the eye or germinative point opens to a leaf, then to another leaf, with a power of transforming the leaf into radicle, stamen, pistil, petal, bract, sepal, or seed.”
“Thus the main divisions of flowering plants are founded on differences in the embryo,- on the number and position of the cotyledons, and on the mode of development of the plumule and radicle.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘radicle’.
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[Open] Correctly-spelled words that l...
Thanks to everyone who added to this list. (I moved it to a new URL, so all the words added on the first day are credited to me—sorry about that.)
(Here’s the original list with a slo...orignal, refect, collum, lightening, manakin, neumatic, mutch, miosis, radicle, tryptic, kyack, apatite and 119 more...
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A Galimafrée of Plant Anatomy & Morph...
A hodgepodge, jumble, jambalaya, *gallimaufry, circus and tent revival of plant anatomy and morphology terms and phrases - its a big tent, and no tickets are required.
*array, collecti...naked bud, leaf blade, brochidodromous, serrate, cork cambium, rhizomatous, flower stalk, deciduous sepal, petal, whorl, nectar gland, stamen and 1348 more...
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reproduction
gravid, hysterectomy, vanishing twin, fetal resorption, fetus papyraceus, craniopagus paras..., vestigial twin, fetus in fetu, pump twin, blighted ovum, fetal pole, crown-rump length and 109 more...
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phrontistery-r
from phrontistery.info
raad, rabanna, rabbet, rabble, Rabelaisian, rabic, racemation, raceme, racemiferous, rach, rachidian, rachiometer and 514 more...
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root tips and other ends
stolon, circinate, calyptrogen, meristem, verticil, fusiform, telomere, skirret, relbun, turpeth, galangal, vetiver and 54 more...
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Allographic Homophones
Words that can be pronounced identically but are spelled differently. I've started with unusual or extensive sets. In some of these sets, no one speaker would pronounce them all the same. I've trie...
air, are, ayr, ayre, e'er, ere, err, eyre, heir, apatite, appetite, picnic and 226 more...
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OED word of the Day
Just like it says
majority, plasm, apal, statin, legerdemain, leap year, daffodil, maternal, key worker, jojoba, skelf, pose and 101 more...
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zachg's Words
verisimilitude, phenomenology, polyvalent, aleatoric, ontology, epistemology, solipsism, monad, hermeneutic, heuristic, performative, constative and 142 more...
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Grow It!
Vocabulary for learning about seeds at Bartram's Garden
embryo, seed coat, cotyledon, testa, epicotyl, hypocotyl, radicle, photosynthesis, root, shoot, plumule
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Forest For The Trees
Words to describe forests, tree parts & tree culture.
petiole, deciduous, phytoremediation, riparian zone, scion, xeriscape, samara, freestone, clingstone, blowdown, butt log, sylvan and 49 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for radicle.

travismcdermott 1671 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 6 3037 The one is called by him (sc. Grew) the Radicle, being that, which, upon the vegetation of the Seed, becomes the Root. Jul 20, 2008