pearl

1. A concretion formed around a grain of sand or other foreign body within the shell of certain mollusks. 2. One of a number of small tough masses, such as mucus occurring in the sputum in asthma. 3. SYN: keratin p..

- Elschnig pearls focal retention of lens fibers that have undergone proliferative and degenerative changes surrounded by lens capsular fragments seen after extracapsular cataract extraction.

- enamel p. SYN: enameloma.

- epithelial p. SYN: keratin p..

- Epstein pearls multiple small, white, epithelial inclusion cysts found in the midline of the palate in newborn infants.

- gouty p. SYN: tophus.

- keratin p. a focus of central keratinization within concentric layers of abnormal squamous cells; seen in squamous cell carcinoma. SYN: epithelial nest, epithelial p., p. (3), squamous p..

- Laënnec pearls obsolete term for small, round, translucent, tenacious bodies in the sputum of some persons with asthma; when floated in water, they become unfurled and are then recognizable as Curschmann spirals.

- squamous p. SYN: keratin p..

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pearl 'pərl n

1) PERLE

2) one of the rounded concentric masses of squamous epithelial cells characteristic of certain tumors

3) a miliary leproma of the iris

4) a rounded abnormal mass of enamel on a tooth

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(purl) 1. a small rounded mass or body. 2. a rounded mass of tough sputum as seen in the early stages of an attack of bronchial asthma. 3. a small medicated granule, or a glass globule with a single dose of volatile medicine, as amyl nitrite.