Calyx is a term used in animal anatomy for some cuplike areas or structures.

Etymology

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

, from ''calyx'' (from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

''κάλυξ, ''case of a bud, husk").

Cnidarians Cnidaria ( ) is a phylum under kingdom Animalia containing over 11,000 species of aquatic invertebrates found both in fresh water, freshwater and marine environments (predominantly the latter), including jellyfish, hydroid (zoology), hydroids, ...

The spicules containing the basal portion of the upper tentacular part of the polyp of some soft corals (also called ''calice'').

Entoprocta

A body part of the

Entoprocta Entoprocta (), or Kamptozoa , is a phylum (biology), phylum of mostly Sessility (zoology), sessile aquatic animals, ranging from long. Mature individuals are goblet-shaped, on relatively long stalks. They have a "crown" of solid tentacles whos ...

from which tentacles arise and the mouth and anus are located.

Echinoderms

The body disk that is covered with a leathery tegumen containing calcareous plates (in

crinoid Crinoids are marine invertebrates that make up the class Crinoidea. Crinoids that remain attached to the sea floor by a stalk in their adult form are commonly called sea lilies, while the unstalked forms, called feather stars or comatulids, are ...

s and ophiuroids the main part of the body where the

viscera In a multicellular organism, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in a structural unit to serve a common function. In the hierarchy of life, an organ lies between tissue and an organ system. Tissues are formed from same type cells to a ...

are located).

Humans

Either a

minor calyx The renal calyces ( calyx) are conduits in the kidney through which urine passes. The minor calyces form a cup-shaped drain around the apex of the renal pyramids. Urine formed in the kidney passes through a renal papilla at the apex into the m ...

in the

kidney In humans, the kidneys are two reddish-brown bean-shaped blood-filtering organ (anatomy), organs that are a multilobar, multipapillary form of mammalian kidneys, usually without signs of external lobulation. They are located on the left and rig ...

, a conglomeration of two or three minor calyces to form a

major calyx The renal calyces ( calyx) are conduits in the kidney through which urine passes. The minor calyces form a cup-shaped drain around the apex of the renal pyramids. Urine formed in the kidney passes through a renal papilla at the apex into the mi ...

, or the

Calyx of Held The calyx of Held is a particularly large excitatory synapse in the mammalian auditory nervous system, so named after Hans Held who first described it in his 1893 article ''Die centrale Gehörleitung''Held, H. "Die centrale Gehörleitung" Arch. ...

, a particularly large

synapse In the nervous system, a synapse is a structure that allows a neuron (or nerve cell) to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another neuron or a target effector cell. Synapses can be classified as either chemical or electrical, depending o ...

in the

mammal A mammal () is a vertebrate animal of the Class (biology), class Mammalia (). Mammals are characterised by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three ...

ian auditory central nervous system, named by H. Held in his 1893 article ''Die centrale Gehörleitung'', due to its flower-petal-like shape. Satzler, K., L. F. Sohl, et al. (2002). "Three-dimensional reconstruction of a calyx of Held and its postsynaptic principal neuron in the medial nucleus of the trapezoid body." J Neurosci 22(24): 10567-79.

Insects

In male insects, a funnel-shaped expansion of the basal part of the ''

vas deferens The vas deferens (: vasa deferentia), ductus deferens (: ductūs deferentes), or sperm duct is part of the male reproductive system of many vertebrates. In mammals, spermatozoa are produced in the seminiferous tubules and flow into the epididyma ...

'' (part of the seminal duct). Also in entomology, a flattened cap of

neuropil Neuropil (or "neuropile") is any area in the nervous system composed of mostly unmyelinated axons, dendrites and glial cell processes that forms a synaptically dense region containing a relatively low number of cell bodies. The most prevalent ...

e in an

insect brain The supraesophageal ganglion (also "supraoesophageal ganglion", "arthropod brain" or "microbrain") is the first part of the arthropod, especially insect, central nervous system. It receives and processes information from the first, second, and t ...

(a component of the

corpus pedunculatum Corpus (plural ''corpora'') is Latin for "body". It may refer to: Linguistics * Text corpus, in linguistics, a large and structured set of texts * Speech corpus, in linguistics, a large set of speech audio files * Corpus linguistics, a branch of ...

) and by certain female insects, an expansion of the

oviduct The oviduct in vertebrates is the passageway from an ovary. In human females, this is more usually known as the fallopian tube. The eggs travel along the oviduct. These eggs will either be fertilized by spermatozoa to become a zygote, or will dege ...

into which the

ovariole An ovariole is a tubular component of the insect ovary, and the basic unit of egg production. Each ovariole is composed of a germarium (the germline Stem-cell niche, stem cell niche) at the anterior tip, a set of developing Oocyte, oocytes containe ...

s open.

References

Cnidarian anatomy Echinoderm anatomy Insect anatomy {{insect-anatomy-stub