acicular

[uh-sik-yuh-ler]

adjective

1. shaped like a needle.

2. Metallurgy.

   1. (of cast iron) containing ferrite in a needlelike form.

   2. (of an alloy) having a microstructure of needlelike components.

Other Word Forms

• acicularity noun
• acicularly adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of acicular¹

First recorded in 1785–95; acicul(a) + -ar ¹

Example Sentences

In a pair of reports from 1957 and 1958, the lab said the talc contained “from less than 1 percent to about 3 percent of contaminants,” described as mostly fibrous and “acicular” tremolite.

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Minute acicular or dendritic crystalline forms sometimes observed in glassy volcanic rocks.

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In this disease cartilage, ligaments, and tendons, bone-marrow, muscle, the endocardium and aorta, the membranes of the brain and spinal cord, the skin and kidneys, may contain deposits of acicular crystals and amorphous granules.

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Much of the calcium in sea-water exists as sulphate; and on evaporation of a drop of sea-water under the microscope this sulphate is deposited as acicular crystals of gypsum.

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The plumbago occurs both amorphous, and in long acicular crystals.

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