▪ I. bleb, n.
(blɛb)
Also 7 blebb.
[app. like blob and blubber, from the action of making a bubble with the lips. In relation to blob, bleb expresses a smaller swelling; cf. top, tip, etc.]
1. A blister or small swelling on the skin; also a similar swelling on plants.
| 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts 319 Wingals..be little swellings like blebs or bladders, on either side the joynt. 1677 Plot Oxfordsh. 174 The blebs or blisters we find on the leaves of many Trees and Shrubs. 1876 Duhring Dis. Skin 228 Blebs may occur in the place of vesicles. |
| fig. 1651 More Enthus. Triumph (1656) 180 You blebs of venery, you bags of filth! |
2. A bubble of air in water, glass, or other substance at some time fluid.
| 1647 H. More Song of Soul Notes 165/2 Dancing blebs and bubbles in the water. 1716 Desaguliers in Phil. Trans. XXIX. 447 The Lens ought to be..without Veins or Blebs. 1861 Furnivall San Graal (Roxb.) Pref. 8 A..green vessel..showing by a bleb in it that it was of glass. |
3. A vesicular body.
| 1775 Ellis in Phil. Trans. LXVI. 15 note, The cell-like divisions..are only a row of single blebs of pith. 1775 Clayton in ibid. 105 From the surface oozes out a gum in round blebs. 1880 J. E. Burton Handbk. Midwives §38. 25 The ovum, or egg, is at first a little bladder, or bleb. |
4. Cytology. A protuberance on the surface of a cell.
| 1962 Laboratory Investigation XI. 1012/1 Lysis of membranes, bleb formation, and disappearance of villi. 1977 Sci. Amer. May 63/1 (caption) Death of a cancer cell is indicated by the blebs, or deep folds, that have appeared on its surface membrane. 1981 Ibid. Mar. 67/2 Many animal cells are capable of amoeboid motion. They flatten out and retract; they develop transitory bumps or bubbles called blebs. 1983 Environmental Res. XXXI. 343 These blebs contained cell organelles, such as mitochondria, vesicles, and ribosomes. |
▪ II. bleb, v.
[f. prec. n.]
1. trans. To furnish with blebs.
| 1821 Clare Vill. Minstr. II. 84 While big drops..bleb the withering hay with pearly gems. |
2. intr. Of a cell: to develop a bleb or blebs. Of paint: to blister.
| [1934 Webster, Bleb, v.t. & i., to cover with blebs or bubbles; bubble. Dial.] 1973 A. K. Harris in Locomotion of Tissue Cells (Ciba Found. Symp. No. 14) 9 As cells respread after being detached, their margins first bleb, until ruffling gradually takes over. 1976 Nature 3 June 413/1 One of the cells did not bleb while the other seven initiated a new bleb every 30 s. 1977 Evening Post (Nottingham) 24 Jan. 9/2 His Lada car was still under guarantee when he notified the suppliers that the paint was ‘blebbing’. 1983 Jrnl. Fish Dis. VI. 33 The membrane facing the PV was smooth and blebbed into the PV. |
Hence blebbed ppl. a.; ˈblebbing vbl. n., the formation of a bleb; a bleb; also as ppl. a.
| 1960 Sci. Amer. Jan. 134/1 Membrane-blebbing and related phenomena. 1961 Webster, Blebbed. 1966 Exper. Cell Res. XLI. 624 In the glutaraldehyde fixed eggs..a large number of membranous outpocketings, membrane blebbings and blister-like elevations can be observed. Ibid. 628 Doubts..that the blebbing membranes are present all the time. 1973 A. K. Harris in Locomotion of Tissue Cells (Ciba Found. Symp. No. 14) 253 In the life of a given culture the majority of cells are isolated..and display vigorous blebbing activity. 1980 Jrnl. Protozool. XXVII. 270/1 The numerous pellicular blebs over these inflated cisternae suggest that their contents may be released by blebbing. 1982 Exper. Cell Res. CXXXIX. 275 Actively dividing cells retained a high proportion of rounded, ruffled and blebbed cells during all phases of the cell cycle. |