MANDIBLE

Mandible

Insect mandibles are a pair of appendages near the insect’s mouth, and the most anterior of the three pairs of oral appendages . Their function is typically to grasp, crush, or cut the insect’s food, or to defend against predators or rivals. Insect mandibles, which appear to be evolutionarily derived from legs, move in the horizontal plane unlike those of vertebrates, which appear to be derived from gill arches and move vertically.

The above text is a snippet from Wikipedia: Mandible (insect mouthpart)
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mandible

Noun

  1. The lower jaw, especially the lower jawbone.
  2. One of a pair of mouthparts of an arthropod designed for holding food.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: mandible
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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