Adjacent Words

spinal cord definitions

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WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: a major part of the central nervous system which conducts sensory and motor nerve impulses to and from the brain; a long tubelike structure extending from the base of the brain through the vertebral canal to the upper lumbar region [syn: spinal cord, medulla spinalis]

Merriam Webster's

noun Date: 1834 the cord of nervous tissue that extends from the brain lengthwise along the back in the vertebral canal, gives off the pairs of spinal nerves, carries impulses to and from the brain, and serves as a center for initiating and coordinating many reflex acts — see brain illustration

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Spinal Spi"nal, a. [L. spinalis, fr. spina the spine: cf. F. spinal. See Spine.] 1. (Anat.) Of, pertaining to, or in the region of, the backbone, or vertebral column; rachidian; vertebral. 2. Of or pertaining to a spine or spines. Spinal accessory nerves, the eleventh pair of cranial nerves in the higher vertebrates. They originate from the spinal cord and pass forward into the skull, from which they emerge in company with the pneumogastrics. Spinal column, the backbone, or connected series or vertebr[ae] which forms the axis of the vertebrate skeleton; the spine; rachis; vertebral column. Spinal cord, the great nervous cord extending backward from the brain along the dorsal side of the spinal column of a vertebrate animal, and usually terminating in a threadlike appendage called the filum terminale; the spinal, or vertebral, marrow; the myelon. The nervous tissue consists of nerve fibers and nerve cells, the latter being confined to the so-called gray matter of the central portions of the cord, while the peripheral white matter is composed of nerve fibers only. The center of the cord is traversed by a slender canal connecting with the ventricles of the brain.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(spinal cords) Your spinal cord is a thick cord of nerves inside your spine which connects your brain to nerves in all parts of your body. N-COUNT

Moby Thesaurus

afferent neuron, autonomic nervous system, axon, brain, central nervous system, cerebral cortex, craniosacral nervous system, dendrite, effector organ, efferent neuron, ganglion, gray matter, internuncial neuron, medullary sheath, nerve, nerve trunk, nervous system, neuron, peripheral nervous system, plexus, sensorium, sensory area, sensory cell, solar plexus, synapse, thoracolumbar nervous system, white matter