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Glite Dictionary
🌳 To remove outer layer 🩺 To remove tissue
to decorticate

to decorticate

9.9
To remove the outer layer of an organ or other body part
  • verb
  • /dɪˈkɔːrtɪkeɪt/
  • Specialized
translation icon : desprender
  • To prepare the sample for analysis, they must decorticate the outer layer of the tissue.

Examples

  • The surgeon needed to decorticate the brain tissue to examine its structure.

  • After studying the specimen, the biologist decided to decorticate the plant to study its cellular composition.

  • Dr. Feuerbach holds the twitching, decorticated Frisky in his hand.

    Fiction book (1997)

Synonyms

to unpeel
vsto decorticate
1 3.4

To remove the outer covering from things like fruit or labels

is used for medical cortex removal rather than everyday peeling of food
to denudate
vsto decorticate
  • Specialized
9.9

To remove plants and the top layer of soil from land so it becomes bare

is the medical removal of an organ's outer cortex rather than surface vegetation

Antonyms

to envelop
41 4.5

To surround something completely, like fog or darkness

How Complete

to denude
5 7.8
to decorticate
  • Specialized
9.9
to debride
  • Specialized
3 9.5
to abrade
5 8.1

Surface Forms

decorticate infinitive
decorticated past
decorticated past participle
decorticating present participle
decorticates third person singular

Morphology

decorticate = corticate (semi-transparent) = de + cortic + ate

In medical contexts the formation de- + corticate is logical, but the root 'cortic' and 'corticate' are specialized terms not known to most learners.

Etymology

Decorticate comes from the parts de- meaning 'remove' and cortex meaning 'outer layer' and originally 'bark', so in medicine to decorticate an organ or the brain is to take off its outer layer to reach or treat what is under it.