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plasm(o)-

Plasma or plasm.

Late Latin from Greek plasma, mould, formation.

The relevant sense of plasma or plasm is that of the colourless fluid part of blood or lymph in which corpuscles or fat globules are suspended. Examples include plasmolysis (Greek lusis, loosening), contraction of the protoplast of a plant cell as a result of loss of water from the cell, resulting in separation of the plasma membrane from the cell wall; plasmid, a genetic structure in a cell that can replicate independently of the chromosomes, typically a small circular DNA strand in the cytoplasm of a bacterium or protozoan; plasmin, an enzyme, formed in the blood in some circumstances, which destroys blood clots by attacking fibrin; plasmodesma (Greek desma, bond, fetter), a narrow thread of cytoplasm that passes through the cell walls of adjacent plant cells and allows communication between them.

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