symphysis

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A growing together of bones originally separate, as of the two pubic bones or the two halves of the lower jawbone.
2. n. A line or junction thus formed.
3. n. An articulation in which bones are united by cartilage without a synovial membrane.
4. n. The coalescence of similar parts or organs.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. In anatomy and zoology: The union or connection of bones in the middle line of the body, either by confluence, by direct apposition, or by the intervention of cartilage or ligament; also, the part, or configuration of parts, resulting from such union or connection. Symphysis usually constitutes an immovable joint, and may be so intimate that all trace of original separateness of the parts is lost. These two conditions are illustrated in the human body in the symphysis of the pubic bones and of the two halves of the lower jaw respectively; but in many animals symphyses remain freely movable, as in the two halves of the lower jaw of serpents. The term is chiefly restricted to the growing together or close apposition of two halves of a bilaterally symmetrical bone, or of a bone with its fellow of the opposite side—other terms, as ankylosis, synosteosis, synchondrosis, and suture, being applied in other cases. See cuts under innominatum and pelvis.
2. n. Some point or line of union between two parts; a commissure; a chiasm: as, the symphysis of the optic nerves.
3. n. Attachment of one part to another; a growing together; insertion or gomphosis with union: as, the symphysis of teeth with the jaw. See acrodont, pleurodont.
4. n. Coalescence or growing together of parts so as to close a natural passage; atresia.
5. n. In botany, a coalescence or growing together of similar parts.

Wiktionary

1. n. The process of two, originally separate bones growing together as the mammalian subject matures, as with the pubic bones or lower jawbones in humans.
2. n. A line discernable on X-ray showing such fusion.
3. n. The cartilaginous material that adjoins and facilitates the junction of such bones, with or without synovia.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. An articulation formed by intervening cartilage.
2. n. The union or coalescence of bones; also, the place of union or coalescence. Cf. articulation.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a growing together of parts or structures
2. n. an abnormal adhesion of two or more structures