decussate

comparative more decussate · superlative most decussate

1. Crossed; intersected; resembling a letter X.
2. biologyHaving anatomical structures or markings crossing each other, typically in an X shape or at right angles.
3. biologyHaving opposite leaves arranged alternately at right angles.

   Juniperites, ju-ne-per-i′tis, s[ubstantive]. A genus of fossil plants, in which the branches are ranged irregularly; leaves short, obtuse, inserted by a broad base, opposite, decussate, and arranged in four rows.

   1849, John Craig, “Juniperites”, in A New Universal Etymological, Technological, and Pronouncing Dictionary of the English Language, Embracing All the Terms Used in Art, Science, and Literature, volumes II (Jac–Zyt), London: Published (for the proprietors,) by Henry George Collins, 22 Paternoster Row, →OCLC, page 15

4. rhetoricConsisting of two rising and two falling clauses, placed in alternate opposition to each other.

   a decussated period

present singular third person decussates · participle present decussating · participle past decussated · past decussated

1. To form an X or to cross or intersect.

   The two trochlears decussate in the anterior medullary velum.

   1949, Herbert Eugene Walter, Leonard Perkins Sayles, Biology of the Vertebrates