cupule

American  

[kyoo-pyool] / ˈkyu pyul /

noun

1. Botany.

   1. a cup-shaped whorl of hardened, cohering bracts, as in the acorn.

   2. a cup-shaped outgrowth of the thallus of certain liverworts.

   3. the apothecium of a cup fungus.

2. Zoology. a small cup-shaped sucker or similar organ or part.

---

cupule British  

/ ˈkjuːpjuːl /

noun

1. biology a cup-shaped part or structure, such as the cup around the base of an acorn

---

Etymology

Origin of cupule

1820–30; < New Latin cūpula, Late Latin: small tub; see cupola

Example Sentences

The team found that, as with the outer seed coat in modern angiosperm seeds, the cupule tissue curved around the developing seeds.

From Science Magazine • May 26, 2021

They called the outer coat a cupule and proposed that it was the precursor to the outer coat, or integument, of angiosperm seeds.

From Science Magazine • May 26, 2021

Until now, researchers had focused on a fossil cupule plant called Caytonia, discovered in Yorkshire, U.K., as the closest relative to angiosperms.

From Science Magazine • May 26, 2021

Now, having a whole group of potential closest relatives with a variety of cupule structures, “gives us different ideas about where the carpel has come from,” Donoghue says.

From Science Magazine • May 26, 2021

The fruit of the oak, being an oval nut growing in a woody cup or cupule.

From Webster's Unabridged Dictionary by Webster, Noah