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Thorax   /θˈɔræks/   Listen
Thorax

noun
(pl. thoraces, thoraxes)
1.
The middle region of the body of an arthropod between the head and the abdomen.
2.
The part of the human torso between the neck and the diaphragm or the corresponding part in other vertebrates.  Synonyms: chest, pectus.
3.
Part of an insect's body that bears the wings and legs.



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"Thorax" Quotes from Famous Books



... year or eighteen months of life, the rounded infantile shape of body persists. The limbs are short and thick, the cheeks full and rounded, the thorax and pelvis are small, the abdomen relatively large and full. The great adipose deposit in the subcutaneous tissue serves as a depot in which water is stored in large amounts. In the healthy child of normal development by the end of the second year a great change ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron

... greedily takes in her mouth the extended and sugared tongue of the dead insect; then once more she presses the neck and the thorax, and once more applies the pressure of her abdomen to the honey-sac of the bee. The honey oozes forth and is instantly licked up. Thus the bee is gradually compelled to disgorge the contents of the crop. This atrocious meal lasts often half an hour and longer, until ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros

... surface. But this morning the trick would not work. Not one spider would keep her hold. But with a piece of wire bent at the end in the shape of a hook, he finally lifted one out upon the ground. How bright and clean and untouched she looked! Her limbs and a part of the thorax were as black as jet and shone as if they had just been polished. No lady in her parlor could have been freer from any touch of soil or earth-stain than was she. On the ground, in the strong sunlight, she seemed to be lost. We turned her around and tried to induce her to enter ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs

... which is used in its construction. In characters the differences of the two forms are so slight as to be distinguishable only by the expert. V. vulgaris often has black spots on the tibiae, which are wanting in germanica. A horizontal yellow stripe on the thorax is enlarged downwards in the middle in germanica, not in vulgaris. There are distinct though slight differences in the genital appendages of the males in the two species. Here there are differences of habit, and ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham

... in the thorax between the lungs, its lower point, or a'pex, being tilted somewhat to the left; the centre and force-pump of ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson

... two on the thorax, one on the abdomen, two on the thighs, one near the patella; turn, please." Alfred turned in the water. "A slight dorsal abrasion; also of the wrists; a severe excoriation ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... water into large cavities, as into that of the abdomen or thorax, or into the ventricules of the brain or pericardium, are more difficult to be reabsorbed, than the effusion of fluids into the cellular membrane; because one part of this extensive sponge-like system of cells, which connects all the solid parts of the body, may have ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin

... tells us of a certain large wasp of Southern Europe, and how it captures the big 'taons' or horse-flies: 'Pour donner le coup de grâce à leurs Taons mal sacrifiés, et se débattants encore entre les pattes du ravisseur, j'ai vu des Bembex mâchonner la tête et le thorax des victimes.' Verily, there is nothing ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various

... model. He is usually a man of thirty, rarely good-looking, but a perfect miracle of muscles. In fact he is the apotheosis of anatomy, and is so conscious of his own splendour that he tells you of his tibia and his thorax, as if no one else had anything of the kind. Then come the Oriental models. The supply of these is limited, but there are always about a dozen in London. They are very much sought after as they can remain immobile for hours, and generally possess lovely costumes. ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde

... reason we know for the digression about Perseus which occupies great part of this ode seems to be that Thorax, who engaged Pindar to write it for Hippokleas, and perhaps Hippokleas himself, belonged to the family of the Aleuadai, who were descended through ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar

... eyes to heaven, as if the person were in a trance, and fixes them in that posture so long that the brain of the beholder grows giddy. Then comes up, deep grumbling, a holy groan from the lower parts of the thorax; but so tremendous in sound, and so long protracted, that you expect to see a goblin rise, like an exhalation through the solid earth. Then he begins to rock from side to side, or backward and forward, like an ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... 83. The THORAX is formed by the sternum in front; the ribs, at the sides; and the twelve dorsal bones of the spinal column, posteriorly. The natural form of the chest is a cone, with its apex above; but fashion, in many instances, has nearly inverted ...
— A Treatise on Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene (Revised Edition) • Calvin Cutter

... Don Cosme, pointing to his thorax, and smiling at the wry faces the major was making. "Wash it down, Senor, with a glass of this claret—or here, Pepe! Is the Johannisberg cool yet? Bring it in, then. Perhaps you prefer ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid

... 17, was concerned with a description of the organs of the thorax, and after a discussion on the structure and action of the heart come ...
— The Evolution of Modern Medicine • William Osler

... I understand it——" Miss Wilkes had become queerly penetrative, and spoke in a way that made one think of a beetle being pinned through the thorax, "——that David Cairns merely used his artistic intelligence for our entertainment; that Andrew Bedient is merely an interesting type of sailor and wanderer who has struck ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort

... nerves. The marrow itself had acquired such solidity as to elude the pressure of our fingers, it resisted as a callous body, and could not be bruised. This hardness was observed all along the vertebrae of the neck, but lessened by degrees, and was not near so considerable in the vertebrae of the thorax. Though the patient was but nine and thirty years old, the cartilages of the sternum were ossified, and required as much labour to cut them asunder as the ribs; like these they were spungy, but somewhat ...
— An Essay on the Shaking Palsy • James Parkinson

... viscera of the entire body are joined through ligaments to the chamber of the breast; and so joined that when the lungs respire, each and all things, in general and in particular, partake of the respiratory motion. Thus when the lungs are inflated, the ribs expand the thorax, the pleura is dilated, and the diaphragm is stretched wide, and with these all the lower parts of the body, which are connected with them by ligaments therefrom, receive some action through the pulmonic action; not to mention further facts, lest those who have no knowledge ...
— Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom • Emanuel Swedenborg

... equally separate in Borneo and Singapore. This last kind does not store the honey in the hind part of the body technically known as the abdomen, but in the middle division which naturalists call the thorax, where it forms a transparent bladder-like swelling, and makes the creature look as though it were suffering with an acute attack of dropsy. In any case, the life of a honey-bearer must be singularly uneventful, not ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen

... "asininity" is the special quality of the writer of the article from which you have taken these words. (2) "Scooping" is the vulgarisation of the portamento, (3) Operatic singers grow stout because they drink stout; also because much singing tends to expand the larynx, pharynx and thorax, as well as the basilico-thaumaturgic cavities of the medulla oblongata. (4) There is nothing criminal in preferring the cornet to any other wind instrument. Many pious people prefer ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 147, August 12, 1914 • Various

... the eyes somewhat rugose, some of the rugose punctures with pale greenish white scales; an abbreviated longitudinal impressed line down the front. Beak short and thick (somewhat as in Pachyrhynchus cumingii, Waterhouse). Thorax irregularly and somewhat coarsely punctured, the sides somewhat wrinkled in front, the punctures scaled, a triangular depression on the posterior part of thorax, the bottom is covered with scales, at least in some specimens, and there ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray

... flabbiness or tension as one or the other leads. Nature arms youth for conflict with all the resources at her command—speed, power of shoulder, biceps, back, leg, jaw—strengthens and enlarges skull, thorax, hips, makes man aggressive and ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... one end to a pair of fire-bellows, and closed at the other end by two stretched sheets of rubber. Fig. 75 is a sketch of what I mean. Corresponding to the bellows there is the human diaphragm, the muscular membrane separating the thorax and abdomen, which expands or contracts as one breathes. Corresponding to the pipe is the windpipe. Corresponding to the two stretched pieces of rubber are the vocal cords, L and R, shown in cross section in Fig. 77. They are part of the larynx and do not show in Fig. 76 (Pl. ...
— Letters of a Radio-Engineer to His Son • John Mills

... were specimens of preserved butterflies and moths, most of them of the gay and common varieties; but some, Nan was almost sure, were rare and valuable. There was one moth in particular, with spread wings, on the upper side of the thorax of which was traced in white the semblance of a human skull. Nan was almost sure that this must be the famous death's-head moth she had read about in school; but she was not confident enough to say anything to old ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr

... not yet noticed by any naturalist is seen in another grasshopper, also common in La Plata (Rhomalea speciosa of Thun-berg). This is an extremely elegant insect; the head and thorax chocolate, with cream-coloured markings; the abdomen steel-blue or purple, a colour I have not seen in any other insects of this family. The fore wings have a protective colouring; the hind wings are bright red. When at rest, ...
— The Naturalist in La Plata • W. H. Hudson

... At night my tent was filled with small water-beetles (Berosi) that quickly put out the candle; and with lovely moths came huge cockchafers (Encerris Griffithii), and enormous and foetid flying-bugs (of the genus Derecterix), which bear great horns on the thorax. The irritation of mosquito and midge bites, and the disgusting insects that clung with spiny legs to the blankets of my tent and bed, were often as effectual in banishing sleep, as were my anxious thoughts ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker

... amused myself one day by observing the springing powers of this insect, which have not, as it appears to me, been properly described. [5] The elater, when placed on its back and preparing to spring, moved its head and thorax backwards, so that the pectoral spine was drawn out, and rested on the edge of its sheath. The same backward movement being continued, the spine, by the full action of the muscles, was bent like a spring; and the insect at this moment rested on the ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin

... woman's. But we shall also be able, although we have only the pelvis before us, to make reliable statements concerning the position of the bones of the lower extremities of *this individual. And we shall be able to say just what the form of the thorax and the curve of the vertebral column were. This, also, we shall have in our power, more or less, to ground on the child-bearing function of woman. But we might go still further and say that this individual, who, according to its pelvic cavity, was a woman, must ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... addicted to opium. Autopsy-sixteen hours after death. Slobbering at the mouth; head caved in; immense rigor mortis; eyes dilated and gouged out; abdomen lacerated; hemorrhage from left ear. Head. Water on the brain; scalp congested, rather; when burst with a mallet interior of head resembled a war map. Thorax. Charge of buckshot in left lung; diaphragm suffused; heart wanting-finger marks in that vicinity; traces of hobnails outside. Abdomen. Lacerated as aforesaid; small intestines cumbered with brick dust; slingshot in ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile

... compression of the veins, it rushes to the brain, and the man dies. Also, and as an additional cause of dissolution, the lungs no longer receive the needful supply of the vital air, owing to the ligature of the cord around the thorax; ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... you will find a great number under the stones on the waste land of a long, smooth, jet-black beetle (a great many of these); also, in the same situation, a very small pinkish insect, with black spots, with a curved thorax projecting beyond the head; also, upon the marshy land over the ferry, near the sea, under old sea-weed, stones, etc., you will find a small yellowish transparent beetle, with two or four blackish marks on the back. Under these stones there are two sorts, one ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin

... a powerful thorax, just like the bat," he went on, shutting the box; "the bones and muscles are tremendously developed, the mouth is extraordinarily powerfully furnished. If it had the proportions of an elephant, it would be an all-destructive, invincible animal. It is interesting when two moles meet ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... corresponding systems of nerves, and one conspicuous connection by which this is provided is the "vagus" nerve. This nerve passes out of the cerebral region as a portion of the voluntary system, and through it we control the vocal organs; then it passes onwards to the thorax sending out branches to the heart and lungs; and finally, passing through the diaphragm, it loses the outer coating which distinguishes the nerves of the voluntary system and becomes identified with those of the sympathetic system, so forming a connecting link between the two and ...
— The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science • Thomas Troward

... or depression on its upper part, much resembling the body of the large American spider; this globular nectary is attached to divergent slender petals not unlike the legs of the same animal. This spider is called by Linneus Arenea avicularia, with a convex orbicular thorax, the center transversely excavated, he adds that it catches small birds as well as insects, and has the venemous bite of a serpent. System Nature, Tom. I. p. 1034. M. Lonvilliers de Poincy, (Histoire Nat. des ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin

... realise his proximity to one of the opposite sex, and began vain endeavours to mate. The female next ate up his right front leg, and then entirely decapitated him, devouring his head and gnawing into his thorax. Not until she had eaten all his thorax, except about three millimetres did she stop to rest. All this while the male had continued in his vain attempt to obtain entrance at the valvula, and he now succeeded, and she voluntarily spread ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... some of the insects he had caught to look at them more narrowly, Arthur placed one on its back, when it sprang up with a curious click and pitched again on its feet. On examining it we found that this was produced by the strong spine placed beneath the thorax, fitting into a small cavity on the upper part of the abdomen. It brings this over its head, and striking the ground with great force, can thus regain its natural position. The creature was about an inch and a half long, and of a brown colour. The light proceeded from a smooth, yellow, ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston

... adolescent model in the limbs and body redeems the grossness of the motive by the inalienable charm of health and carnal comeliness. Finally, the technical merits of the work cannot too strongly be insisted on. The modelling of the thorax, the exquisite roundness and fleshiness of the thighs and arms and belly, the smooth skin-surface expressed throughout in marble, will excite admiration in all who are capable of appreciating this aspect of the statuary's art. Michelangelo produced nothing ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds

... knows something about magnetism, he suggested making a very thin needle into a magnet; then breaking it into very short pieces, which would still be magnetic, and fastening one of these pieces with some cement on the thorax of the insect ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin



Words linked to "Thorax" :   pectoral muscle, gall bladder, sternum, prothorax, bust, pectoral, breastbone, arthropod, pectoralis, insect, male chest, area of cardiac dullness, gallbladder, body, female chest, thoracic aorta, musculus pectoralis, pecs, torso, rib cage, vena thoracica, chest cavity, thoracic vein, vertebrate, craniate, thoracic cavity, trunk, body part, breast



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