Link Centre Dictionary

autotomy

au·to·tomy

UK/ɔːˈtɒtəmi/ uncommon

noun

1.

spontaneous removal or casting off of a body part (as the tail of a lizard or claw or a lobster) especially when the organism is injured or under attack

Origin

From auto- + -tomy, after German Autotomie or French autotomie.

Related words

Word family

Broader terms

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.