bulb

 

Inherited from Middle English bulb, bolbe, from Latin bulbus (“bulb, onion”), from Ancient Greek βολβός (bolbós, “plant with round swelling on underground stem”).

• enPR: bŭlb, IPA^(key): /ˈbʌlb/
• (Southern US, African-American Vernacular, obsolete) IPA^(key): /ˈbʌb/^[1]

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ʌlb

bulb (plural bulbs)

2. The bulb-shaped underground portion of a plant such as a tulip, consisting of a shortened stem and many fleshy scale leaves, from which the rest of the plant may be regrown.
   • 2005, Plato, translated by Lesley Brown, Sophist, page 265c:

     the plants which grow in the earth from seed or bulbs.

   • 2015 February 7, Val Bourne, “The quiet man of the world of snowdrops”, in The Daily Telegraph (London), page G8:

     Once it [a snowdrop variety] became established, some bulbs were lifted and passed on to be chipped (i.e. cut into small pieces and grown on).

3. (dated, neuroanatomy) The medulla oblongata.
4. Any solid object rounded at one end and tapering on the other, possibly attached to a larger object at the tapered end.

   the bulb of the aorta

   1. A light bulb (not necessarily bulbous in shape).

      an incandescent bulb

      an LED bulb

      a fluorescent tube bulb

5. (nautical) A bulbous protuberance at the forefoot of certain vessels to reduce turbulence.
6. (obsolete) An onion.

bulb (third-person singular simple present bulbs, present participle bulbing, simple past and past participle bulbed)

1. (intransitive) To take the shape of a bulb; to swell.

• blub

Borrowed from Latin bulbus.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencia) [ˈbulp]

bulb m (plural bulbs)

1. (botany) bulb (bulb-shaped root of a plant)

• bulb galàctic
• bulb raquidi

• bulbil
• bulbós

• “bulb” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

Borrowed from French bulbe.

bulb m (plural bulbi)

1. bulb