Definitions

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

  • adjective Of or relating to the trigeminal nerves; trifacial.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In anatomy and zoöl, triple, triune, or threefold: specifically noting the trifacial or fifth cranial nerve (which see, under trifacial). Also trigeminous.
  • Of or pertaining to the trigeminal nerve: as, a trigeminal foramen.
  • noun The trigeminal nerve; the trigeminus. See trifacial.

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

  • adjective (Anat.) Of, pertaining to, or designating, the fifth pair of cranial nerves, which divide on each side of the head into three main branches distributed to the orbits, jaws, and parts of the mouth; trifacial.

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

  • adjective anatomy Of or pertaining to the trigeminal nerve (the fifth cranial nerve).

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the main sensory nerve of the face and motor nerve for the muscles of mastication

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

tri- +‎ geminal

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Examples

Comments

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  • "A sneeze is usually triggered by an irritation in the nose, which is sensed by the trigeminal nerve, a cranial nerve responsible for facial sensation and motor control. This nerve is in close proximity to the optic nerve, which senses, for example, a sudden flood of light entering the retina. As the optic nerve fires to signal the brain to constrict the pupils, the theory goes, some of the electrical signal is sensed by the trigeminal nerve and mistaken by the brain as an irritant in the nose. Hence, a sneeze."

    - Karen Schrock, 'Looking at the Sun Can Trigger a Sneeze' in Scientific American, 10 January 2008.

    September 29, 2008

  • "When cold water touches the face, an impulse travels along the trigeminal and vagus nerves to the central nervous system and lowers the metabolic rate. The pulse slows down and the blood pools where it's needed most, in the heart and skull. It's a sort of temporary hibernation that drastically reduces the body's need for oxygen. Nurses will splash ice water on the face of a person with a racing heart to trigger the same reaction."

    —Sebastian Junger, The Perfect Storm, 1997 (NY: HarperCollins, 1999), 146

    August 26, 2009

  • Ooh, bad memories. My first ever laptop was a brand called Tri-Gem. And it was a lemon. Worked fine only briefly and then the AC power supply died. By then the company seemed to not exist and I ended up having to get a new power supply custom made. But of course there were no BIOS updates available, etc., which in those days were pretty necessary to keep things ticking at least passably well. Landfill.

    August 26, 2009

  • Hm. It appears your laptop might have benefited from hypothermia.

    August 26, 2009

  • "The side of my face felt as though it were on fire, and jolts of pain shot through the trigeminal nerve with each heartbeat, making the muscles twitch and the eye water terribly."

    —Diana Gabaldon, A Breath of Snow and Ashes (New York: Bantam Dell, 2005), 735

    February 3, 2010