Cytoplast

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The living interior of a cell, including its nucleus and the surrounding cytoplasm, but not the outer membrane or wall
2. The inner protoplasmic body of a cell, comprising the nucleus together with the cytoplasm that surrounds it
3. The content of a cell enclosed within its outer boundary, made up of the nucleus and the cytoplasm around it

Etymology: "Cytoplast" is a technical coinage built from two Greek-derived combining forms. The first, "cyto-", comes from Greek "kytos", meaning "hollow vessel" or "cell", and the second, "-plast", comes from Greek "plastos", meaning "formed" or "moulded", the same root found in "protoplasm" and "plastid". Put together, the word names the living material inside a cell, apart from its outer membrane. The term belongs to modern biology rather than to ancient Greek. Scientists assembled it from classical parts to label a specific piece of cell anatomy, so the Greeks themselves never used it. Its meaning is fixed by its construction: the "formed" substance of the cell, the part that the cell's membrane encloses.

Synonyms: cell body, protoplast, cytoplasm-containing cell, cell without nucleus, plant cell