Plastron

Definitions

1. The nearly flat part of the shell structure of a tortoise or other animal, similar in composition to the carapace.
2. A half-jacket worn under the jacket for padding or for safety.
3. A man's shirt-bosom.
4. An ornamental front panel on a woman's bodice.
5. A breastplate.
6. A film of air trapped by specialized hairs against the body of an aquatic insect, and which acts as an external gill.

Equivalents

5 more languages

العربيةالدّرع

Suomialakilpi

Bahasa Indonesiaplastron

Polskiplastron

Русскийпластро́н

Examples

“The great tortoise that in myth is said to support⟳ the world and is thus an embodiment of the galaxy, without whose swirling order⟳ we would be a lonely wanderer in space, is supposed to have⟳ revealed in ancient times the Universal Rule⟳, since lost, by which one might always be sure of acting rightly. Its carapace represented the bowl of heaven, its plastron the plains of all the worlds.”

“I bought here a wedding dress perhaps twenty or thirty years old [...] a sequin plastron to be worn over the womb as a feminine equivalent to a cod-piece, and a gauze veil embroidered in purple and gold.”

“"Why, compared to what thou wast, Hugo, thou art as a deerskin coat to a steel plastron.-- Art thou not in love⟳, man? Answer⟳ me!" "Something like⟳, I fear me, beau sire,” replied the squire.”

“He therefore persuaded the Casa de Antillas to supply⟳ him with a hundred steel plastrons or corselets, with armlets and shoulder plates, and a hundred morions, or pikemen's helmets. This heavy armor was suitable […]”

“The plastron of a diving beetle is not directly a source of oxygen, but acts as a gill, acquiring oxygen from the surrounding water.”

“Total independence of atmospheric air is possible only if insects have⟳ a permanent gas store or incompressible gas gill, called a plastron. Unlike compressible gas stores, the volume of a plastron remains constant and it is incompressible.”

“2013, Jon F. Harrison, Lutz T. Wasserthal (revisions & updates), 17: Gaseous Exchange⟳, R. F. Chapman, Stephen J. Simpson (editor), Angela E. Douglas (editor), The Insects: Structure⟳ and Function, 5th Edition, page 535, The plastrons of other insects are generally less efficient than that of Aphelocheirus as they have⟳ a less dense hair pile from which the air is more readily displaced.”

CEFR level