ovule
Botany.
a rudimentary seed.
the plant part that contains the embryo sac and hence the female germ cell, which after fertilization develops into a seed.
Biology. a small egg.
Origin of ovule
1Words Nearby ovule
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use ovule in a sentence
It also explains why sometimes you get cobs with bare patches—sometimes not every ovule gets fertilized.
The bizarre botany that makes corn a fruit, a grain, and also (kind of) a vegetable | empire | July 8, 2021 | Popular-ScienceBefore those ears look anything like the juicy kernel-covered cob you eat, they’re essentially a hard cylinder covered in hundreds of unfertilized ovules.
The bizarre botany that makes corn a fruit, a grain, and also (kind of) a vegetable | empire | July 8, 2021 | Popular-ScienceEach of these ovules grows a single silk, which reaches up and out of the top of the husk, where it dangles in the hopes of catching a bit of pollen on its little sticky hairs.
The bizarre botany that makes corn a fruit, a grain, and also (kind of) a vegetable | empire | July 8, 2021 | Popular-ScienceWe know he had been for many years interested in the ovule, and he made a number of important discoveries respecting it.
We must recollect that the comparative morphology of the ovule (in the wide sense) was not attempted.
When at Malacca Griffith interested himself among many other problems in the ovule and the development of the seed of Avicennia.
Interest in the structure of the ovule and the nature of fertilisation was widespread at the time Griffith worked.
The ovary is free, and the carpels, one or more in number, contain each a single ovule.
The Sea Shore | William S. Furneaux
British Dictionary definitions for ovule
/ (ˈɒvjuːl) /
a small body in seed-bearing plants that consists of the integument(s), nucellus, and embryosac (containing the egg cell) and develops into the seed after fertilization
zoology an immature ovum
Origin of ovule
1Derived forms of ovule
- ovular, adjective
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Scientific definitions for ovule
[ ō′vyōōl, ŏv′yōōl ]
The female reproductive structure that develops into a seed in a seed-bearing plant. An ovule consists of a megasporangium surrounded by one or two layers of tissue called integuments. The megasporangium produces spores that develop into megagametophytes. These megagametophytes remain within the tissues of the ovule and produce one or more egg cells. Sperm from pollen grains enter the ovule through an opening called a micropyle and fertilize the egg cells. The resulting embryo then begins to develop within the ovule, which becomes a seed. Among the conifers and cycads, the ovules are typically found in pairs on scales in the female cones. The ovules of angiosperms are contained in a structure called the ovary within in the flower. See more at flower gametophyte megasporogenesis pollination.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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