cell
English
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
From Middle English celle, selle, from Old English cell (attested in inflected forms), from Latin cella (“chamber, small room, compartment”), later reinforced by Old French cel, sele, Old French cele.
Noun
cell (plural cells)
- A single-room dwelling for a hermit. [from 10th c.]
- 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, VI.6:
- So, taking them apart into his cell, / He to that point fit speaches gan to frame […].
- 1764, Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto, IV:
- For three days he and his attendants had wandered in the forest without seeing a human form: but on the evening of the third they came to a cell, in which they found a venerable hermit in the agonies of death.
- 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, VI.6:
- (now historical) A small monastery or nunnery dependent on a larger religious establishment. [from 11th c.]
- A small room in a monastery or nunnery accommodating one person. [from 14th c.]
- Gregor Mendel must have spent a good amount of time outside of his cell.
- A room in a prison or jail for one or more inmates. [from 18th c.]
- The combatants spent the night in separate cells.
- Each of the small hexagonal compartments in a honeycomb. [from 14th c.]
- (biology, now chiefly botany) Any of various chambers in a tissue or organism having specific functions. [from 14th c.]
- 1858, Asa Gray, Introduction to Structural and Systematic Botany, fifth edition, p. 282:
- Each of the two cells or lobes of the anther is marked with a lateral line or furrow, running from top to bottom […].
- 1858, Asa Gray, Introduction to Structural and Systematic Botany, fifth edition, p. 282:
- (obsolete) Specifically, any of the supposed compartments of the brain, formerly thought to be the source of specific mental capacities, knowledge, or memories. [14th-19th c.]
- 1890, Oscar Wilde, chapter XVI, in The Picture of Dorian Gray:
- From cell to cell of his brain crept the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible of all man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling nerve and fibre.
- A section or compartment of a larger structure. [from 16th c.]
- (obsolete, chiefly literary) Any small dwelling; a remote nook, a den. [16th-19th c.]
- Template:RQ:Florio Montaigne Essayes
- 1810, Walter Scott, Lady of the Lake, II:
- Not long shall honour'd Douglas dwell, / Like hunted stag, in mountain-cell […].
- A device which stores electrical power; used either singly or together in batteries; the basic unit of a battery. [from 19th c.]
- This MP3 player runs on 2 AAA cells.
- (biology) The basic unit of a living organism, consisting of a quantity of protoplasm surrounded by a cell membrane, which is able to synthesize proteins and replicate itself. [from 19th c.]
- 1999, Paul Brown & Dave King, The Guardian, 15 Feb 1999:
- An American company has applied to experiment in Britain on Parkinson's disease sufferers by injecting their brains with cells from pigs.
- 2011, Terence Allen & Graham Cowling, The Cell: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford 2011, p. 3:
- In multicellular organisms, groups of cells form tissues and tissues come together to form organs.
- 1999, Paul Brown & Dave King, The Guardian, 15 Feb 1999:
- (meteorology) A small thunderstorm, caused by convection, that forms ahead of a storm front. [from 20th c.]
- There is a powerful storm cell headed our way.
- (computing) The minimal unit of a cellular automaton that can change state and has an associated behavior. [from 20th c.]
- The upper right cell always starts with the color green.
- (card games) In FreeCell-type games, a space where one card can be placed.
- A small group of people forming part of a larger organization, often an outlawed one. [from 20th c.]
- Those three fellows are the local cell of that organization.
- (communication) A short, fixed-length packet as in asynchronous transfer mode. [from 20th c.]
- Virtual Channel number 5 received 170 cells.
- (communication) A region of radio reception that is a part of a larger radio network.
- I get good reception in my home because it is near a cell tower.
- (geometry) A three-dimensional facet of a polytope.
- (statistics) The unit in a statistical array (a spreadsheet, for example) where a row and a column intersect.
- (architecture) The space between the ribs of a vaulted roof.
- (architecture) A cella.
- (entomology) An area of an insect wing bounded by veins
Usage notes
In the sense of an electrical device, "cell" is the technically correct name for a single unit of battery-type power storage, whereas a battery is a device comprising multiple of them, though it is often used for simple cells.
Quotations
- For quotations using this term, see Citations:cell.
Synonyms
- See also Thesaurus:cell
Derived terms
- battery cell
- blood cell
- brain cell
- cancer cell
- cellblock
- cellbound
- cell division
- cell house
- cell line
- cellmate
- cell membrane
- cell theory
- cell type
- dry cell
- fat cell
- fuel cell
- germ cell
- helper T cell
- host cell
- nerve cell
- photoconductive cell
- photoelectric cell
- photoemissive cell
- photovoltaic cell
- prison cell
- red blood cell
- red cell
- sickle cell
- skin cell
- solar cell
- stem cell
- T cell
Related terms
Translations
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Verb
cell (third-person singular simple present cells, present participle celling, simple past and past participle celled)
- (transitive) To place or enclose in a cell.
- (Can we date this quote by Warner and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- Celled under ground.
- (Can we date this quote by Warner and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “cell”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)
Etymology 2
From cell phone, from cellular phone, from cellular + telephone
Noun
cell (plural cells)
- (US, informal) A cellular phone.
Usage notes
- Widely used attributively.
Translations
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Further reading
- “cell”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “cell”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
- “cell”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- Template:projectlink
French
Etymology
Abbreviation of téléphone cellulaire.
Pronunciation
Noun
cell m (plural cells)
Synonyms
Old Irish
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
cell f
Inflection
Feminine ā-stem | |||
---|---|---|---|
Singular | Dual | Plural | |
Nominative | |||
Vocative | |||
Accusative | |||
Genitive | |||
Dative | |||
Initial mutations of a following adjective:
|
Descendants
Mutation
Old Irish mutation | ||
---|---|---|
Radical | Lenition | Nasalization |
cell | chell | cell pronounced with /ɡ(ʲ)-/ |
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. |
References
- Gregory Toner, Sharon Arbuthnot, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Marie-Luise Theuerkauf, Dagmar Wodtko, editors (2019), “cell”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language
Swedish
Pronunciation
audio (file)
Noun
cell c
- cell; a room in a prison.
- Cell; a room in a monastery for sleeping one person.
- Cell; a small group of people forming part of a larger organization.
- (biology) Cell; the basic unit of a living organism.
- (biology) Cell; a cavity in a structure such as a honeycomb.
- (computing) Cell; a minimal unit of a cellular automaton.
Declension
Declension of cell | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
Singular | Plural | |||
Indefinite | Definite | Indefinite | Definite | |
Nominative | cell | cellen | celler | cellerna |
Genitive | cells | cellens | cellers | cellernas |
Welsh
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
cell f (plural celloedd)
- cell
- Often used as the second part of a compound word denoting a place, i.e. llyfrgell (library), literally "llyfr" (book) + "cell".
Mutation
Welsh mutation | |||
---|---|---|---|
radical | soft | nasal | aspirate |
cell | gell | nghell | chell |
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. |
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