specimen
noun
a part or an individual taken as exemplifying a whole mass or number; a typical animal, plant, mineral, part, etc.
specimens
-
pluralof specimen.plural
The grammatical form denoting more than one person, place, thing, or idea.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
When the fossils were originally found, scientists had far fewer mosasaur specimens available for comparison, making it difficult to determine exactly what kind of mosasaur the bones represented.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 15, 2026
Even so, combining CT data from several specimens, including the only two complete skulls in existence, allows scientists to move beyond centuries of speculation and make more evidence-based interpretations of the bird's biology.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 9, 2026
For all the examples raised here, museums are inherently safe places for specimens.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 7, 2026
He then compared the collection with the 80 specimens at the Herpetology Collection at the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum and the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of Berkeley.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 7, 2026
Socios en Salud wasn’t granted access to Peru’s national lab, so Farmer sent the ten specimens back to Boston and deposited them at the Massachusetts State Lab.
From "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder and Michael French
