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FOSSA
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Irregular inflected form: fossae
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Largest carnivore of Madagascar; intermediate in some respects between cats and civets
Synonyms:
Cryptoprocta ferox; fossa; fossa cat
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("fossa" is a kind of...):
viverrine; viverrine mammal (small cat-like predatory mammals of warmer parts of the Old World)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Monotypic genus of Madagascar civets closely related to palm civets
Synonyms:
Fossa; genus Fossa
Classified under:
Nouns denoting animals
Hypernyms ("Fossa" is a kind of...):
mammal genus (a genus of mammals)
Meronyms (members of "Fossa"):
fanaloka; Fossa fossa (civet of Madagascar)
Holonyms ("Fossa" is a member of...):
family Viverridae; family Viverrinae; Viverridae; Viverrinae (genets; civets; mongooses)
Sense 3
Meaning:
A concavity in a surface (especially an anatomical depression)
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Nouns denoting two and three dimensional shapes
Hypernyms ("fossa" is a kind of...):
bodily cavity; cavity; cavum ((anatomy) a natural hollow or sinus within the body)
concave shape; concavity; incurvation; incurvature (a shape that curves or bends inward)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "fossa"):
glenoid cavity; glenoid fossa (the concavity in the head of the scapula that receives the head of the humerus to form the shoulder joint)
glenoid fossa; mandibular fossa (a deep concavity in the temporal bone at the root of the zygomatic arch that receives the condyle of the mandible)
epigastric fossa; pit of the stomach (a slight depression in the midline just below the sternum (where a blow can affect the solar plexus))
Context examples:
A triangular muscle within the iliac fossa that flexes the thigh and rotates the leg medially.
(Iliacus, NCI Thesaurus)
An anterior ethmoidal artery branch that supplies the meningeal tissues in the anterior fossa of the cranium.
(Anterior Meningeal Artery, NCI Thesaurus)
A rare congenital brain malformation disorder characterized by agenesis or hypoplasia of the cerebellar vermis, cystic dilatation of the fourth ventricle, and enlargement of the posterior fossa.
(Dandy-Walker Malformation, NCI Thesaurus)
When administered intrathecally, indium In 111 pentetate percolates up the spinal canal with the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) to the basal cisterns of the posterior and middle cranial fossas.
(Indium In 111 Pentetate, NCI Thesaurus)
A terminal branch of the external carotid artery running from the ramus of the jaw to the pterygopalatine fossa with numerous branches supplying the deep structures of the face.
(Maxillary Artery, NCI Thesaurus)
The definition of N3b TNM finding depends on the specific type of cancer that it refers to; for example, for breast cancer it refers to metastases in clinically detected ipsilateral internal mammary lymph nodes in the presence of one or more positive axillary lymph nodes, or in more than 3 axillary lymph nodes and in internal mammary lymph nodes with micrometastases or macrometastases detected by sentinel lymph node biopsy but not clinically detected; for gastric cancer it refers to metastases in sixteen or more regional lymph nodes; for nasopharyngeal cancer it refers to extension to the supraclavicular fossa.
(N3b Stage Finding, NCI Thesaurus)
One of eight or ten projections from the dorsum of the tongue forming a row anterior to and parallel with the sulcus terminalis; each papilla is surrounded by a circular trench (fossa) having a slightly raised outer wall (vallum); on the sides of the vallate papilla and the opposed margin of the vallum are numerous taste buds.
(Circumvallate Papilla, NCI Thesaurus)
Cutting diagonally across the mottled plans is the long extensional fault of Inanna Fossa, which stretches eastward 370 miles (600 kilometers) from here to the western edge of the great nitrogen ice plains of Sputnik Planum.
(What’s Eating at Pluto?, NASA)
