1884 Q. Jrnl. Microsc. Sci. 24 110 Amœboid cells were frequently budded off from the ectoderm to join the other devouring cells (phagocytes) in the body.

1890 E. R. Lankester Advancem. Sci. ii. 112 [Metschnikoff's] theory is that by accustoming these corpuscles, which he calls ‘phagocytes’, to tolerate a weak form of the poison produced by pathogenic Bacteria, we ‘educate’ them, so that they are able subsequently to resist and eventually to attack and destroy the same pathogenic Bacterium when present in a stronger and deadly form.

1898 P. Manson Trop. Dis. i. 26 This body [sc. the flagellated organism of malaria] seems to have a powerful attraction for the phagocyte.

1939 F. A. Knott Clin. Bacteriol. iii. 45 The lining cells of the hepatic spaces (Küpffer cells) and the reticular cells of the cells of the spleen and lymph glands and the septal cells lining the pulmonary alveoli..can all be shown..to be active phagocytes and capable of ingesting pathogenic bacteria.

1947 A. D. Imms Outl. Entomol. (ed. 3) ii. 59 Phagocytes..are basophil and of variable appearance and character: their amoeboid activities enable them to digest tissue debris, bacteria, &c., and they greatly increase in numbers during ecdysis and metamorphosis.

1972 R. Hartenstein Princ. Physiol. xi. 494 Reticular cells differentiate into various forms of phagocytes including the fixed dust cells of vertebrate lungs, cellular linings of sinuses within glands, fixed Kupffer cells in the capillary sinusoids of liver.

1995 McGill Jrnl. Med. Spring 75/1 Phagocytes have Fc receptors and C3b receptors that promote the binding to and elimination of antibody and/or complement-coated cells.

2002 Here's Health Mar. 61/1 Vitamin C is important for the production of phagocytes, which help fight germs in the bloodstream.

1890 Cent. Dict. Phagocytal.

1900 Lancet 15 Dec. 1709/2 Dr. Habershon's idea is to increase the phagocytal power of the leucocytes by supplying them with glycogen.

2003 Polish Jrnl. Vet. Sci. 6 (Suppl. 3) 60 Biotropin increases the phagocytal activity of leucocytes.

1905 Proc. Royal Soc. B. 76 508 Levaditi also showed that the vibrios on to which the ‘substance sensibilisatrice’ had been fixed when introduced into the circulation of a normal animal were rapidly phagocyted, just as they are in the case of an actively immunised animal.

1906 Jrnl. Exper. Med. 8 676 This possibility that a second substance besides the opsonins may determine the number of organisms phagocyted, also exists in the case of normal blood serum.

1926 Q. Rev. Biol. 1 256/1 The present author believes that such phagocytosis is a secondary phenomenon and that the trypanosomes which are phagocyted have already been injured, if not killed, by agencies present in the serum.

1933 M. Fernán-Núñez tr. S. Ramón y Cajal Histol. xxi. 547 The Kupffer cells..phagocyte senile and injured erythrocytes.

1949 Science 19 Aug. 187/2 Evidence has recently been presented that encapsulated bacteria which cause acute respiratory disease are phagocyted in the body in the absence of opsonins by a mechanism termed ‘surface phagocytosis’.

1961 H. Chantrenne Biosynthesis of Proteins iii. 88 The low residual incorporation observed in enucleate Amoeba proteus is due to the activity of micro-organisms recently phagocyted by the Amoeba.

2004 Biomaterials 25 835 Debris generated at the articular surfaces enters the periprosthetic tissue where it is phagocyted by macrophages.

1906 Jrnl. Exper. Med. 8 676 With a dilution of 1:20 not more than four or five staphylococci are taken up by the phagocyting cells.

1989 Microbial Pathogenesis 7 346 Do porins inhibit the macrophage phagocyting activity by stimulating the adenylate-cyclase?

2004 Amer. Jrnl. Physiol. C. 286 129 In this process, microglial cells undergo multiple morphological and functional changes from the resting cell toward a fully activated, phagocyting tissue macrophage.