sulcus

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin sulcus (“a furrow made by a plow”). Doublet of sullow ("plough").

noun

  1. (anatomy) A furrow or groove in an organ or a tissue, especially that marking the convolutions of the surface of the brain.
    Coordinate term: gyrus
    The largest sulcus, the longitudinal fissure, divides the brain into left and right hemispheres. 1999, Thomas C. Pritchard, Kevin D. Alloway, Medical Neuroscience, page 55
    Unlike most other sulci, the lateral sulcus is very deep. 2006, Inderbir Singh, Textbook of Human Neuroanatomy, 7th edition, page 72
    The large surface area of the human cerebral cortex results in a pattern of gyri and sulci. 2014, John Kiernan, Raj Rajakumar, Barr's The Human Nervous System: An Anatomical Viewpoint, 10th edition, page 213
  2. (planetology) A region of subparallel grooves or ditches formed by a geological process.

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