▪ I. fibre, n.
(ˈfaɪbə(r))
Forms: 4 fybre, 7 fiuer, fiver, 7, 9 fiber, 9 fifer (dial.), 7– fibre.
[a. F. fibre (= Sp., Pg., It. fibra), ad. L. fibra, of uncertain origin; variously referred by etymologists to L. roots fid- (as in findĕre to split) and fis- or fī- (as in fīlum thread). The spelling fiber is common in the U.S., but is now rare in England.]
† 1. After Latin usage: a. A lobe or portion of the liver. b. pl. The entrails. Obs.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. v. xxxix. (1495) 153 The endes of the lyuer hyght fybre for they..beclepyth the stomake. 1598 R. Grenewey Tacitus' Ann. xiv. x, They..aske counsell of their gods by the aspect of mans intrales and fibres. 1601 Holland Pliny I. 342 The lobes or fibres in the smal Liuers of certaine Mice. |
2. Phys. One of a number of thread-like bodies or filaments, that enter into the composition of animal (muscular, nervous, etc.) and vegetable tissue.
a. in animals.
fibres of Corti: see
Cortian a.
| 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts (1658) 99 His blood..hath no Fibres or small veins in it. 1621 G. Sandys Ovid's Met. vi. (1626) 113 The threds Of life, his fiuers, wrathfull Delius shreds. 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. iii. xv. 142 Wormes..whose bodies consist of round and annulary fibers. 1664 Power Exp. Philos. i. 5 Her wings look like a Sea-fan with black thick ribs or fibers, dispers'd..through them. 1704 F. Fuller Med. Gymn. (1711) 33 The Fibre it self strengthens by Use. 1793 Holcroft Lavater's Physiog. xx. 98 In cold countries the fibres of the tongue must be less flexible. 1808 A. Parsons Trav. i. 7 The natives eat the myrtle berries as an astringent; their fibres being rendered extremely lax by the climate. 1855 Bain Senses & Int. i. ii. §4 The optic nerve..might contain as many as a million of fibres. 1888 J. Martineau Study Relig. I. ii. i. 305 Its two thousand fibres of Corti stretched. |
| fig. a 1634 Chapman (W.), Yet had no fibres in him, nor no force. 1638 W. Grant in G. Sandys' Paraphr. Div. Poems Pref. Verse, Truth..so sweetely strikes Upon the Cords, and Fivers of the Heart. 1742 Young Nt. Th. v. 1059 The tender tyes, Close-twisted with the fibres of the heart! 1831 Carlyle Misc. (1857) II. 329 Every fibre of him is Philistine. 1847 Emerson Poems, Monadnoc Wks. (Bohn) I. 435 And of the fibre..Whose throbs are love. a 1853 Robertson Addr. ii. (1858) 55 They are bound up in every fibre of my being. |
b. in plants;
esp. an elongated cell that lacks protoplasm, has thick walls and tapering ends, and serves to strengthen plant tissue.
| 1663 Cowley Ode Dr. Harvey i, No smallest Fibres of a Plant..His passage after her withstood. 1676 Hale Contempl. i. 254 A Worm..gnaws asunder the Roots and Fibres of it. 1703 Pope Vertumnus 16 The thirsty plants..feed their fibres with reviving dew. 1791 Hamilton Berthollet's Dyeing I. i. i. iii. 52 The vascular fibres of the bark. 1838 T. Thomson Chem. Org. Bodies ii. v. 984 There is..an attraction between vegetable fibres and watery liquids. 1857 A. Henfrey Elem. Bot. 513 Prosenchyma is composed of cells elongated greatly in one direction, and attenuated to a more or less acute point at each end, forming what is called a fibre. 1865 Lubbock Preh. Times xiii. (1869) 462 They also used the fibres of the cocoa nut for making threads. 1919 F. O. Bower Bot. Living Plant ii. 28 The old name parenchyma is kept for a tissue of roughly spherical or oblong cells with square ends, while long thick-walled cells with pointed ends are called fibres. 1965 Bell & Coombe tr. Strasburger's Textbk. Bot. (new ed.) 107 Within the limit of elasticity, the load-bearing capacity of sclerenchyma fibres taken from the living plant is, generally speaking, equal to that of the best wrought iron. |
3. One of the thread-like filaments of organic structure which form a textile or other material substance; also
transf. of inorganic substances.
| 1827 Faraday Chem. Manip. ii. 49 A silk fibre. 1832 Babbage Econ. Manuf. iv. (ed. 3) 32 Twisting the fibres of wool by the fingers would be a most tedious operation. 1832 G. R. Porter Porcelain & Gl. 282 Delicate..fibres of glass joined with the greatest nicety. 1878 Huxley Physiogr. 193 A very liquid lava may be caught by the wind, and drawn out into delicate fibres. |
4. collect. a. A substance consisting of fibres, whether animal or vegetable. Also, Fibrous structure.
| 1810 Henry Elem. Chem. (1826) II. 273 The woody fibre..does not undergo any change. 1831 R. Knox Cloquet's Anat. 7 Nervous fibre: this is the peculiar substance of which the brain and nerves are composed. 1847 Emerson Repr. Men, Montaigne Wks. (Bohn) I. 349 He has contrived to get so much bone and fibre as he wants. 1854 H. Miller Footpr. Creat. x. (1874) 183 note, Pieces of coal which exhibit the ligneous fibre. 1858 Carpenter Veg. Phys. §42 Even these primary tissues may be regarded as consisting of other parts still more simple,—namely, membrane and fibre. |
b. fig.| 1855 Bain Senses & Int. iii. iv. §17 A man of the political fibre. 1872 Bagehot Physics & Pol. (1876) 47 There is an improvement in our fibre—moral, if not physical. 1885 Century Mag. XXX. 398/1 This love of fierce and cruel sport was in the fiber. |
c. A structure characteristic of wrought metal in which there is a directional alignment or elongation of crystals or inclusions.
| 1855 W. Truran Iron Manuf. Gt. Brit. xviii. 161 If the several layers [of metal] are thin and cross each other, the tendency of one layer to develope fibre is neutralized by the opposite tendency of the other. 1928 Williams & Homerberg Princ. Metallogr. (ed. 2) vi. 200 A study of fiber in steel is of great importance..in the manufacture of such articles as crankshafts, gears, and other forgings. 1966 McGraw-Hill Encycl. Sci. & Technol. VIII. 286/2 Hot-working processes, such as forging, align the inclusions (fiber structure). |
5. esp. A fibrous substance fit for use in textile fabrics.
| 1870 Yeats Nat. Hist. Comm. 70 Vegetable fibres find India their most prolific home. 1875 D. Kay in Encycl. Brit. (ed. 9) I. 565/1 The most important fibre is the crin vegetal..produced from the dwarf palm. 1879 J. Paton Ibid. IX. 131/2 Textile Fibres..include all substances capable of being spun, woven, or felted. 1892 K. Tynan in Speaker 3 Sept. 290/1 [The roses] were swathed in cocoanut fibre and sacking. |
6. A subdivision of a root, a small root or rootlet;
occas. of a twig.
| 1656–81 Blount Glossogr., Fibers, the smal threads, or hair⁓like strings of roots. 1694 Acc. Sev. Late Voy. ii. 56 The Root consists of many small Fibers. 1787 Winter Syst. Husb. 153 Their numerous fibres or lateral roots will extend themselves horizontally. 1807 J. E. Smith Phys. Bot. 105 After they [plants] have begun to throw out new fibres, it is more or less dangerous..to remove them. 1810 Scott Lady of L. i. xxv, Where weeping birch and willow round With their long fibres swept the ground. 1821 Shelley Prometh. Unb. i. 154 To the last fibre of the loftiest tree. 1840 Spurdens Suppl. Voc. E. Anglia, Fifers..fibrous roots. |
| fig. a 1679 T. Goodwin Wks. (1697) IV. ii. 65 To apply Christ, is..to strike forth a Sprig or Fibre from every Faculty into him. 1869 Goulburn Purs. Holiness vii. 55 Whatever fibres there are in our nature by which we cling and cleave to those around us. 1879 Farrar St. Paul (1883) 177 A man who had tried..to extirpate the very fibres of the church. |
† 7. In Kepler's system of celestial physics: see
quot. Obs.| [1618 Kepler Epit. Astron. Copernic. v. (1635) 643 Posuimus, in cuiuslibet planetæ corpore duplices inesse fibras..fibræ latitudinis fere quidem in parallelo situ manent toto circuitu.] 1715 tr. Gregory's Astron. I. i. lxviii. 139 [The Planet] will come nearer to the Sun, till the Right lines drawn according to the direction of this part (that is, the Fibres along which this attractive Virtue is propagated from the Sun)..are no more inclined to the Sun. Ibid. lxix. 143 In each Planet there are Fibres (which he calls from their Office, the Fibres of Latitude). |
8. attrib. and
Comb., as
fibre-cultivation,
fibre-dresser,
fibre-form,
fibre-machine,
fibre-mute,
fibre needle;
fibre-dressing,
fibre-forming,
fibre-yielding adjs.; also
fibre-basket (see
quot.);
fibre-board,
fibreboard, (a piece of) board made from compressed cellulosic fibrous material (as wood pulp);
fibre-cell (see
quot. 1884);
fibre-faced a., (
a)
U.S. (paper) having a surface composed of visible fibres; (
b) having a facing or coat of fibre;
fibre-gun (see
quot.);
fibre optics, the study and application of the transmission of images by means of total internal reflection through fibres of glass or other transparent solids; so
fibre-optic adj.;
fibre plant, any plant that produces a fibre of commercial value;
fibre-saturation point, in the drying of timber, the point at which the cell cavities have lost all their moisture but none has been removed from the cell walls, corresponding in most woods to a moisture content of about 30 per cent of the dry weight;
fibre-stitch (see
quots.);
fibre stress, the local longitudinal stress in a body at a point in, or along a line through, a cross-section over which the stress is not uniform;
fibre-tip(ped) a., of a pen: having a tip made of tightly-packed capillary fibres which hold the ink;
cf. felt(
-tip,
-tipped)
pen s.v. felt n.1 4 d; also
ellipt. as
fibre tip;
fibre-tracheid Bot., a fibre-like tracheid that typically has a thick wall, tapering ends, and bordered pits with slit-like apertures;
fibre tract [
tract n.3 3 b (a)], a bundle of nerve-fibres,
esp. one in which the fibres have a common origin, termination, and function.
| 1884 Syd. Soc. Lex., *Fibre-basket, Schultze's term for the sustentacular tissue of the retina. |
| 1897 Sears, Roebuck Catal. 616/2 Lunch boxes... Well made of compressed *fibre board. 1916 Bull. U.S. Dept. Agric. No. 322 17 It would seem that tow would be a more desirable as well as a more profitable raw material than straw for the fiber-board manufacturer. 1950 C. C. Handisyde Building Materials xix. 263 Fibreboards should be unpacked and stacked on a clean dry surface. 1970 Nature 9 May 489/1 The chief problem with making fibre board from bagasse is that vast amounts of dust are created when the material is pulped. |
| 1878 Bell Gegenbauer's Comp. Anat. 31 The..contractile *fibre-cells constitute the first form. 1884 Syd. Soc. Lex., Fibre-cell, Kölliker's term for the fusiform, nucleated, cellular structures which form the involuntary muscles. |
| 1892 Pall Mall G. 21 July 7/1 The progress made in *fibre cultivation in the colony. |
| 1904 Daily Chron. 9 Dec. 7/3 A younger brother, who was employed at a horse-hair and *fibre dressers. 1919 Brit. Manufacturer Nov. 25/1 Passing on to more specialised agricultural appliances, we find great attention paid to *fibre-dressing machinery, especially in the Yorkshire and Lancashire districts. |
| a 1884 Knight Dict. Mech. Suppl. 332/2 *Fiber-faced paper, a means of security against the restoration of the surface of check or draft-paper after it has been tampered with. It consists in imbedding in the pulp..a layer of fibers, the outer ends of which are then raised in the form of a nap, [etc.]. 1922 Times 20 June 8/5 At right angles to this disc is a fibre-faced wheel which is mounted on a castellated shaft, along which it can be slid by means of the ‘gear’ lever. |
| 1946 Nature 19 Oct. 553/2 Alginic acid yarn can be acetylated without loss of *fibre-form. Ibid. 28 Dec. 930/1 A new *fibre-forming polymer..to which the name ‘Terylene’ has been provisionally assigned. |
| 1874 Knight Dict. Mech., *Fiber-gun, a device for disintegrating vegetable fiber. |
| 1887 Pall Mall G. 6 May 12/1 A few leaves..were recently passed through Death's *fibre machine. |
| 1946 A. L. Bacharach Brit. Mus. vii. 107 The trumpets should use *fibre mutes (now in general use, but then confined to jazz bands) instead of the old pear⁓shaped brass ones. |
| 1913 Talking Machine News & Jrnl. Amusements Feb. 147/2, I should advise ‘Troubled’ to try the *Fibre needles advertised in this paper. 1929 Wilson & Webb Mod. Gramophones 153 A fibre needle, in a sound-box specially made for it. |
| 1961 Flight LXXIX. 728/1 Windows in the passenger cabin..may be augmented by closed-circuit television or ‘*fibre optic’ devices. 1965 Amer. Jrnl. Cardiol. XV. 672/1 The fiberoptic system depends upon the efficient transmission of light lengthwise along glass fibers, each of which has a core of high refractive index and a sheath of low refractive index. |
| 1956 Times 3 Dec. 59/1 If one beam of light can be transmitted along a glass tube, why not transmit detailed images along the same path?.. Dr. Narinder Singh Kapany, 30, has succeeded by applying a technique he refers to as ‘*fiber optics’. Ibid., Fiber optics derives its name from its use of hair-thin strands of optical glass as light carriers. 1957 N. S. Kapany in Jrnl. Optical Soc. Amer. XLVII. 117 (heading) An introduction to fiber optics. 1961 Engineering 4 Aug. 134/1 Fibre optics grew out of a need to look round corners, e.g. into complex castings or inside the kidney of a living person. 1970 Times Lit. Suppl. 23 July 817/1 The action of the vocal cords during speech can be observed..through a flexible fiber-optics tube which is inserted through the nose so that its end hangs above the vocal cords. |
| 1887 C. A. Moloney Sk. Forestry W. Afr. 277 ‘Buaze’ *fibre plant of the Zambesi (Securidaca longipedunculata). 1957 Encycl. Brit. VII. 939/1 The fibre plant Carludovica palmata (not a palm), used for making Panama hats. |
| 1930 Forestry IV. 34 The loss of the free moisture marks the first stage in drying at any point in the wood, and it is not until this moisture has all gone and the stage known as ‘the *fibre saturation point’ is reached, that the cell⁓walls begin to dry. |
| 1882 Caulfeild & Saward Dict. Needlework, *Fibre stitch, a stitch used in Honiton and other Pillow Laces to make open leaves, with a fibre running down their centres. 1957 M. B. Picken Fashion Dict. 129 Fiber-stitch, stitch used in bobbin lace. |
| 1905 A. H. Heller Stresses in Structures vii. 91 The maximum unit *fiber stress (working stress). 1931 G. A. Garratt Mech. Prop. Wood iv. 200 In large beams the weight should be taken into account in calculating the fiber stress. 1952 Special Rep. Iron & Steel Inst. XLIII. iv. 171/2 The maximum fibre stress in bending may be distinctly less than that based on an elastic state of distribution. |
| [1965 Geyer's Dealer Topics July 54/2 Fine point marking pen has acrylic fiber-tip.] 1969 Encycl. Amer. XV. 180/1 The greatest progress in the development of writing inks has taken place since the 1940's..due to the development..of..the ball-point pen, the felt-tip marker, and the *fiber-tip pen. 1971 Sunday Times 31 Oct. 17/3 Ball-points, fibre-tips and fountain pens all freeze up, as does the hand that tries to push them in sub-zero conditions. 1976 Electr. Australia Apr. 75/1 A Nestler B5 pen generally gives more control than is possible with brushes or fibre tips. 1983 Austral. Microcomputer Mag. Sept. 89/4 Wet ink drawing pens, felt-tip markers and fibre-tip pens may be used. |
| 1974 Encycl. Brit. Macropædia XIX. 1046/1 A Japanese-made *fibre-tipped pen found great success in the Japanese and U.S. markets beginning in 1964. 1985 Observer (Colour Suppl.) 10 Mar. 31/1 There is an overwhelming choice of felt and fibre tipped pens on the market. |
| 1898 H. C. Porter tr. Strasburger's Text-bk. Bot. 129 In Oaks, Beeches, and in the Rosiflorae wood fibres are absent, and the necessary rigidity is provided for by *fibre tracheids. 1953 K. Esau Plant Anat. x. 204 Wall thickness and particularly the nature of pitting are used to differentiate between the two main categories of wood fibers, fiber-tracheids and libriform fibers. |
| 1904 Brit. Jrnl. Psychol. I. 53 *Fibre-tracts from corresponding halves of the retinae both go to the occipital region of one and the same hemisphere. 1959 Chambers's Encycl. IX. 771/2 The medulla oblongata contains nerve cells and fibre tracts associated with certain of the cranial nerves. |
| 1908 R. W. Sindall Manuf. Paper ii. 40 A large and important genus of *fibre-yielding plants. |
Add:
[4.] d. Dietary material that is resistant to the action of the digestive enzymes, consisting chiefly of the cell walls of plants; roughage. Also
dietary fibre.
| 1909 Amer. Jrnl. Physiol. XXIV. 103 The intake of crude fibre was reduced to that of normal bran. 1937 Ann. Internal Med. X. 965 There exists a quantitative relation between the amount of crude fiber ingested and the laxative result. 1966 Jrnl. Dairy Sci. XLIX. 1046/1 Twenty-four Holsteins..were used..to study the effect of dietary fiber level on intake and performance. 1975 Washington Post 27 Apr. c6 The need for fiber or, as grandmother used to call it, roughage. 1984 Abraham & Llewellyn-Jones Eating Disorders ix. 127 Increased dietary fibre may prevent you from developing certain diseases.., such as haemorrhoids, irritable bowel, diverticular disease, [etc.]. 1986 Here's Health Apr. 127/2 Bran is one type of fibre, nature's own ‘filler’ that is present only in plant foods and is essential for proper digestion and elimination. |
8. fibrefill orig. U.S. [introduced by E. I. Du Pont de Nemours Inc., Wilmington, Delaware, and ‘dedicated to the public as a generic’ (private letter to R.W.B., 8 May 1969)], a kind of material made of synthetic fibres, used for padding garments, cushions, quilts, etc.
| 1963 N.Y. Times 22 Dec. 13 Parka..insulated with 100{pcnt} Vycron virgin polyester *fiberfill for warmth without weight. 1967 Times 17 May 19 Prices of filament yarns, industrial yarns and fibrefill remain unchanged. 1972 [see non-allergic a.]. 1989 B. A. Mason Love Life 23 Steve works at the mattress factory. The factory is long and low and windowless, and bales of fiberfill hug the walls. |
▪ II. fibre, v. rare.
(
ˈfaɪbə(r))
[f. prec. n.] intr. Of plants: To form or throw out fibres.
| 1869 Daily News 6 Feb., The plant is sufficiently strong, with ample room to fibre as prodigally as it likes. |