NUCLEUS • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Nucleus

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/nˈukliəs/ Listen

noun

Nucleus n. (pl. E. nucleuses, L. nuclei)

1.

A kernel; hence, a central mass or point about which matter is gathered, or to which accretion is made; the central or material portion; used both literally and figuratively. "It must contain within itself a nucleus of truth."

2.

(Astron.) The body or the head of a comet.

3.

(Bot.)

(a)

An incipient ovule of soft cellular tissue.

(b)

A whole seed, as contained within the seed coats.

4.

(Biol.) A body, usually spheroidal, in a eukaryotic cell, distinguished from the surrounding protoplasm by a difference in refrangibility and in behavior towards chemical reagents, which contains the chromosomal genetic material, including the chromosomal DNA. It is more or less protoplasmic, and consists of a clear fluid (achromatin) through which extends a network of fibers (chromatin) in which may be suspended a second rounded body, the nucleolus (see Nucleoplasm). See Cell division, under Division. Note: The nucleus is sometimes termed the endoplast or endoblast, and in the protozoa is supposed to be concerned in the female part of the reproductive process. See Karyokinesis.

5.

(Zool.)

(a)

The tip, or earliest part, of a univalve or bivalve shell.

(b)

The central part around which additional growths are added, as of an operculum.

(c)

A visceral mass, containing the stomach and other organs, in Tunicata and some mollusks.

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Etymology of 'Nucleus'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Nucleus" Quotes from Famous Books

... led to feel that the ideal presented by the life and death of our Saviour could never have been accepted by Jews at all, if its whole purport had been made intelligible during the Redeemer's life-time; that in order to insure its acceptance by a nucleus of followers it must have been endowed with a more local aspect than it was intended afterwards to wear; yet that, for the sake of its subsequent universal value, the destruction of that local complexion was indispensable; that the corruptions inseparable ...

— The Fair Haven • Samuel Butler

... three nights, and spent the time chiefly in gambling, a pastime which from the first night of our festivity cast its devilish snares around me. Some half-dozen of the smartest club members chanced to be together at early dawn in the Jolly Peasant, and forthwith formed the nucleus of a gambling club, which was reinforced during the day by recruits coming back from the town. Members came to see whether we were still at it, members also went away, but I with the original six held out for days and nights ...

— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner

... labor bodies and men's unions, and by the example of the thorough training given to young women taking up work in other fields somewhat analogous. Such a school for women might very well prove in this country the nucleus of university extension work in the labor movement for both men and women, similar to that which has been so successfully inaugurated in Great Britain, and which is making headway in Canada ...

— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry

... and careless life. He was fond of fox-hunting, horse-racing, and cock-fighting. There were no large towns, and the planters met each other mainly on occasion of a county court or the assembling of the Burgesses. The court-house was the nucleus of social and political life in Virginia as the town-meeting was in New England. In such a state of society schools were necessarily few, and popular education did not exist. Sir William Berkeley, who was the royal governor of the colony ...

— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers

... formed the United Presbyterian Church, with which his name was afterwards to be so closely associated. The United Church comprised five hundred and eighteen congregations, of which about fifty were, like those in Berwick, in England; the nucleus of that English Synod which, thirty years later, combined with the English Presbyterian Church to form the present Presbyterian Church of England. References in his correspondence show that this union of ...

— Principal Cairns • John Cairns

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