a solid whose surface is generated by a line passing through a fixed point and a fixed plane curve not containing the point, consisting of two equal sections joined at a vertex.
a plane surface resembling the cross section of a solid cone.
anything shaped like a cone: sawdust piled up in a great cone; the cone of a volcano.
ice-cream cone.
Botany.
the more or less conical multiple fruit of the pine, fir, etc., consisting of overlapping or valvate scales bearing naked ovules or seeds; a strobile.
a similar fruit, as in cycads or club mosses.
Anatomy. one of the cone-shaped cells in the retina of the eye, sensitive to color and intensity of light.Compare rod (def. 17).
one of a series of cone-shaped markers placed along a road, as around an area of highway construction, especially to exclude or divert motor vehicles.
(in a taper thread screw or bevel gear) an imaginary cone or frustum of a cone concentric to the axis and defining the pitch surface or one of the extremities of the threads or teeth.
Ceramics. pyrometric cone.
verb (used with object),coned,con·ing.
to shape like a cone or a segment of a cone.
Origin of cone
1480–90; <Latin cōnus<Greek kônos pine-cone, cone-shaped figure; akin to hone1
Cone Mills features in all the major chapters of the 20th century.
Glenn Beck Is Now Selling Hipster Clothes. Really.|Ana Marie Cox|December 20, 2014|DAILY BEAST
For his part, Logan now believes that more than 95 percent of cone bearing trees are infected.
What It Takes to Kill a Grizzly Bear|Doug Peacock|November 23, 2014|DAILY BEAST
In those early days, a loudspeaker was set in a plywood basket or frame with a circle cut out for the cone.
Sidney Harman: An Extraordinary Life|Jonathan Alter|April 13, 2011|DAILY BEAST
Whatever you think of the two pieces of music on display in these videos, one thing is beyond dispute: America loves a cone bra.
Bra of the Century|Rebecca Dana|June 15, 2010|DAILY BEAST
From cone bras at Jean-Paul Gaultier to Doc Martens and crop-tops on Lindsay Lohan and Agyness Deyn, grunge-era fashion is back.
Viva La 1990s!|Isabel Wilkinson|May 5, 2010|DAILY BEAST
We did so, and saw in the bright sunlight a dense dark cloud rising up out of the cone.
Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures|Arabella B. Buckley
The scales of the cone are the parts which under more favorable conditions would have been leaves.
Cornell Nature-Study Leaflets|Various
Raut gripped the hand-rail tightly, and stared down at the cone.
The Plattner Story and Others|H. G. Wells
So the base of any branch is a cone quite buried in the parent stem.
Trees Worth Knowing|Julia Ellen Rogers
It may be well for them to have breathed through the cone on several occasions and to play a sort of game with it.
Psychotherapy|James J. Walsh
British Dictionary definitions for cone
cone
/ (kəʊn) /
noun
a geometric solid consisting of a plane base bounded by a closed curve, often a circle or an ellipse, every point of which is joined to a fixed point, the vertex, lying outside the plane of the base. A right circular cone has a vertex perpendicularly above or below the centre of a circular base. Volume of a cone: 1/3 π r ² h, where r is the radius of the base and h is the height of the cone
a geometric surface formed by a line rotating about the vertex and connecting the peripheries of two closed plane bases, usually circular or elliptical, above and below the vertexSee also conic section
anything that tapers from a circular section to a point, such as a wafer shell used to contain ice cream
the reproductive body of conifers and related plants, made up of overlapping scales, esp the mature female cone, whose scales each bear a seed
a similar structure in horsetails, club mosses, etcTechnical name: strobilus
a small cone-shaped bollard used as a temporary traffic marker on roads
Also called: retinal coneany one of the cone-shaped cells in the retina of the eye, sensitive to colour and bright light
verb
(tr)to shape like a cone or part of a cone
Word Origin for cone
C16: from Latin cōnus, from Greek kōnus pine cone, geometrical cone
A three-dimensional surface or solid object in which the base is a circle and upper surface narrows to form a point. The surface of a cone is formed mathematically by moving a line that passes through a fixed point (the vertex) along a circle.
A rounded or elongated reproductive structure that consists of sporophylls or scales arranged spirally or in an overlapping fashion along a central stem, as in conifers and cycads. For example, the familiar woody pinecone is actually the female cone, made up of ovule-bearing scales. The smaller male cones of the pine consist of thin overlapping microsporophylls. These produce pollen that is carried by the wind to fertilize ovules in the female cones. When the seeds in the female cones mature, the cones of many pine species expand to release them. In some pine species, cones release seeds only in response to the presence of fire. See also strobilus.
One of the cone-shaped cells in the retina of the eye of many vertebrate animals. Cones are extremely sensitive to light and can distinguish among different wavelengths. Cones are responsible for vision during daylight and for the ability to see colors. Compare rod.