pedicle

From Latin pedīculus (“little foot”), diminutive of pēs.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛdɪkəl/

pedicle (plural pedicles)

1. (zoology) A fleshy line used to attach and anchor brachiopods and some bivalve molluscs to a substrate.
   • 1867, William Henry Smyth, The Sailor's Word-Book‎:

     A species of shell-fish, often found sticking by its pedicle to the bottom of ships, doing no other injury than deadening the way a little: "Barnacles, termed soland geese In th' islands of the Orcades."

2. (zoology) The attachment point for antlers in cervids.
   • 1910, John T. McCutcheon, In Africa‎:

     His long, rakish horns are mounted on a pedicle that extends above his head, thus accentuating the droll length of his features.

3. A stalk that attaches a tumour to normal tissue
   • 1859, Joseph Maclise, Surgical Anatomy‎:

     --Figure 3. Fig. 4, Plate 58, represents the neck of the bladder and neighbouring part of the urethra of an ox, in which a polypous growth is seen attached by a long pedicle to the veru montanum and blocking up the neck of the bladder.

   • 1896, George M. Gould, Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine‎:

     One of these women, a secundipara, had gone two weeks over time, and had a large ovarian cyst, the pedicle of which had become twisted, the fluid in the cyst being sanguineous.

4. pedicel (any sense)
   • 1914, Alexander Teixeira De Mattos, The Mason-bees‎:

     One of the ends is lengthened out into a neck or pedicle, which is as long as the egg proper.

5. peduncle (any sense)
   • 1998 January 9, Patrick J. Gannon et al., “Asymmetry of Chimpanzee Planum Temporale: Humanlike Pattern of Wernicke's Brain Language Area Homolog”, in Science‎, volume 279, number 5348, →DOI, pages 220–222:

     The chimpanzee Heschl's gyrus homolog also showed evidence of a strongly excavated middle Heschl's sulcus, within the confines of a single gyral pedicle, predominantly in the right hemisphere.

   • 2001 May 11, Maarten Kamermans et al., “Hemichannel-Mediated Inhibition in the Outer Retina”, in Science‎, volume 292, number 5519, →DOI, pages 1178–1180:

     The surface of the extracellular space at the base of the cone pedicle in goldfish has been estimated to be between 0.01 to 0.1 µm 2 depending on the fixation procedure used [ C. A. V. Vandenbranden, et al., Vision Res.

6. (surgery) Part of a skin or tissue graft temporarily left attached to its original site.
7. A fetter for the foot.

• pedicel

• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “pedicle”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• pedicel