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The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dura mater

Dura mater \Du"ra ma"ter\ [L., lit., hard mother. The membrane was called mater, or mother, because it was formerly thought to give rise to every membrane of the body.] (Anat.) The tough, fibrous membrane, which lines the cavity of the skull and spinal column, and surrounds the brain and spinal cord; -- frequently abbreviated to dura. [1913 Webster] ||

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
dura mater

"tough outer membrane surrounding the brain," c.1400, from Medieval Latin dura mater cerebri, literally "hard mother of the brain," a loan-translation of Arabic umm al-dimagh as-safiqa, literally "thick mother of the brain." "In Arabic, the words 'father,' 'mother,' and 'son' are often used to denote relationships between things" [Klein].

Wiktionary
dura mater

n. (context anatomy English) The tough and inflexible outermost of the three layers of the meninges

WordNet
dura mater

n. the outermost (and toughest) of the 3 meninges [syn: dura]

Wikipedia
Dura mater

Dura mater ( or ), or dura, is a thick membrane that is the outermost of the three layers of the meninges that surround the brain and spinal cord. It is derived from mesoderm.

The other two meningeal layers are the arachnoid mater and the pia mater. The dura surrounds the brain and the spinal cord and is responsible for keeping in the cerebrospinal fluid.

Usage examples of "dura mater".

She could not bring herself to say it, and only then did Sean realize that Dedans brain, still contained in the tough white membrane of the dura mater, was bulging out through the rent in his skull like an inner tube through a hole in an auto tire.

This protection in itself would scarcely be of much use if the sudden movement of the head, in response to a blow, smashed the brain against the hard internal surface of the skull, or even against the fibrous dura mater.

She snipped open the dura mater - the gray leathery membrane that covers the brain.

As the circle of bone and flesh was lifted away, Jeri looked down at the dura mater.

He teased away a fragment of bone lying across the tear in the dura mater.

The tough, fibrous membrane that lines the inside of the cranium, the dura mater, is supposed to be creamy white.

Vecher's own intern was injecting the man's skull, thickening the dura mater for the crushing pressures of braking.

The warning of the administrator slid face up into my brain as if inscribed on a cool stone slab: I read the words of that warning as they pressed against the surfaces of the dura mater, graven and terrible.

She knew what she'd see when the bone fragments had been carefully lifted out of the fracture and frozen for later replacement, when the torn dura mater had been further slit and the bruised tissue beneath it magnified by the powerful surgical scope.

She set her husband's head in the clamp and used a micrometer to get the skull-fittings so tight and so accurate that the needle would push through the dura mater at exactly the right point.

As I stitched the flap of scalp back into place, covering the aperture in the depths of which the dura mater pulsed ominously, I wondered if I had truly done mankind a great service by preserving this specimen of it.