microphyll

/ (ˈmaɪkrəʊfɪl) /

noun

botany the relatively small type of leaf produced by club mosses and horsetailsCompare megaphyll

QUIZZES

HEED THE VOX POPULI, AND TAKE THIS WORD OF THE DAY QUIZ!

Test your memory on these verbal firecrackers from the week of June 29 to July 5!
Question 1 of 7
anchorite
a granular metamorphic rock.
a person who has retired to a solitary place for a life of religious seclusion.
a hobble or fetter for a horse or other animal.
TAKE THE QUIZ TO FIND OUT

Words nearby microphyll

microphonic, microphonism, microphotograph, microphotometer, microphthalmia, microphyll, microphysics, microphyte, micropipette, microplankton, microplethysmography
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 microphyll

microphyll
[ mī′krə-fĭl′ ]

A leaf with only one vascular bundle and no complex network of veins. Horsetails and lycophytes (such as club mosses) have microphylls. Microphylls on modern plants are generally small but in extinct phyla the same structures could grow quite large. In contrast to megaphylls, microphylls are thought to have evolved from modifications of a single stem.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.