Umbilical cord. (a) (Anat.) The cord which connects the fetus with the placenta, and contains the arteries and the vein through which blood circulates between the fetus and the placenta; the navel-string. (b) (Bot.) The little stem by which the seeds are attached to the placenta; -- called also funicular cord. -- Umbilical hernia (Med.), hernia of the bowels at the umbilicus. -- Umbilical point (Geom.), an umbilicus. See Umbilicus, 5. -- Umbilical region (Anat.), the middle region of the abdomen, bounded above by the epigastric region, below by the hypogastric region, and on the sides by the lumbar regions. -- Umbilical vesicle (Anat.), a saccular appendage of the developing embryo, containing the nutritive and unsegmented part of the ovum; the yolk sac. See Illust. in Appendix.

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OXFORD DICTIONARY

umbilical, adj.
1 of, situated near, or affecting the navel.
2 centrally placed.

Idiom

umbilical cord
1 a flexible cordlike structure attaching a foetus to the placenta.
2 Astronaut. a supply cable linking a missile to its launcher, or an astronaut in space to a spacecraft.

Etymology

obs. F umbilical or f. UMBILICUS

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ROGET THESAURUS

umbilical

Centrality

N centrality, centricalness, center, middle, focus, core, kernel, nucleus, nucleolus, heart, pole axis, bull's eye, nave, navel, umbilicus, backbone, marrow, pith, vertebra, vertebral column, hotbed, concentration, centralization, symmetry, center of gravity, center of pressure, center of percussion, center of oscillation, center of buoyancy, metacenter, central, centrical, middle, azygous, axial, focal, umbilical, concentric, middlemost, rachidian, spinal, vertebral, middle, midst, centrally.

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