cell

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
cell/sel/

▶noun

• 1 a small room in which a prisoner is locked up or in which a monk or nun sleeps.

  ■ historical a small monastery dependent on a larger one.

• 2 a small compartment in a larger structure such as a honeycomb.

• 3 Biology the smallest structural and functional unit of an organism, consisting of cytoplasm and a nucleus enclosed in a membrane.

• 4 a small group forming a nucleus of political activity: terrorist cells.

• 5 a device containing electrodes immersed in an electrolyte, used for current generation or electrolysis.

  ■ a unit in a device for converting chemical energy or light into electricity.

• 6 the local area covered by one of the short-range transmitters in a cellular telephone system.

  ■ N. Amer. a mobile phone.

– derivatives
-celled adjective.

– origin OE, from OFr. celle or L. cella ‘storeroom or chamber’.