vibrissa

/vɪˈbɹɪsə/

vibrissa noun: any of the tactile whiskers on the nose of an animal such as a cat.

Noun

vibrissa (plural vibrissae)

Any of the tactile whiskers on the nose of an animal such as a cat.
- There are also long hairs inside each ear and sometimes on its tip, and about a dozen very long and strong hairs—the whiskers or vibrissæ— are placed on each upper lip.1881, St George Jackson Mivart, The Cat, London: Murray, page 14
Any similar feather near the mouth of some birds.
(in plural) A thick hair found inside the nostrils of humans and other mammals.
- The vibrissae are coarse hairs whose follicles are located just within the nasal meatus. […] Vibrissae are present in most mammals, but their innervation and role in sensory function appears to be less pronounced in humans.2012, David W. Kennedy, Peter H. Hwang, editors, Rhinology: Diseases of the Nose, Sinuses, and Skull Base, Thieme, →ISBN
Synonyms:

nose hair

அதிர்மயிர், நீளமுறுக்கு மயிர், முரட்டு மயிர், மென்மையற்ற மயிர், தொண்டுணரி

plural	vibrissae

Borrowed from Latin vibrissae.

What does vibrissa mean?: Vibrissa means any of the tactile whiskers on the nose of an animal such as a cat.
What is vibrissa in Tamil?: Vibrissa in Tamil is அதிர்மயிர், நீளமுறுக்கு மயிர், முரட்டு மயிர். See Vibrissa meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is vibrissa?: Vibrissa is a noun.
How do you pronounce vibrissa?: Vibrissa is pronounced /vɪˈbɹɪsə/.
What is the plural of vibrissa?: The plural of vibrissa is vibrissae.

Adapted from Wiktionary: vibrissa (page history and authors); vibrissa (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-vibrissa.wav.

Cite this entry: “vibrissa.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/vibrissa. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.