Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A bitter, yellow alkaloid, C20H19NO5, obtained from several plants such as goldenseal and having medical uses as an antipyretic and antibacterial agent.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun An alkaloid (C20H17 NO4) widely distributed in the vegetable kingdom, being found in the barberry and a considerable number of plants, or parts of plants, whose extracts combine a yellow color and bitter taste.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Chem.) An alkaloid obtained, as a bitter, yellow substance, from the root of the barberry, gold thread, and other plants.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun chemistry An alkaloid obtained, as a bitter, yellow substance, from the root of the barberry, gold thread, and other plants.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[New Latin Berberis, barberry genus (from Medieval Latin berberis, barberry) + –ine.]

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