cell
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- pronunciation:
- sel
- features:
- Homophone Note, Word History, Word Explorer
| part of speech: |
noun |
| definition 1: |
a single unit of animal life or plant life. The human body is made of many kinds of very small cells.
Skin cells, blood cells, and brain cells look very different from each other.
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| definition 2: |
a small room in a prison or jail.
The prisoner had to stay in his cell most of the day. |
| related words: |
bay, cabin |
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The words
cell and
sell sound alike but have different meanings.
Cell comes from
celare, a Latin word that means "to hide." By the 1300s, "cell" meant "small monastery" or "small room." In the late 1300s, it was used for the compartments that the brain was thought to be separated into. The current use of the word "cell" in biology first occurred in 1845.