English

Verb

strobilate ‎(third-person singular simple present strobilates, present participle stobilating, simple past and past participle stobilated)

1. (intransitive, biology) To produce a strobilus (layered, conelike structure).
   • 2007 September 16, “‘My Family Has High Hopes for Me Because They Know I’m Going to Do Great Things.’”, in New York Times:

     So that’s what we try to do, make them strobilate faster.

   • 2014, Theo Tait, ‘Water-Borne Zombies’, London Review of Books, vol. 36 no. 5:

     These, in turn, reproduce by cloning; when conditions are right, they ‘strobilate’, elongating and splitting into a stack of discs which develop into larvae, and break away to become medusae.

Related terms

• strobilus