pterygiophore

Noun. (marine biology) The bones in a fish that support the dorsal fin. There are two to three of them: proximal, middle, and distal; In spinous fins the distal is often fused to the middle or not present at all.

This is an unmodified, but possibly outdated, definition from Wiktionary and used here under the Creative Commons license. Wiktionary is a great resource. If you like it too, please donate to Wikimedia.

This entry was last updated on RefTopia from its source on 3/20/2012.