locust

[ loh-kuhst ]

noun

1. Also called acridid, short-horned grasshopper. any of several grasshoppers of the family Acrididae, having short antennae and commonly migrating in swarms that strip the vegetation from large areas.
2. any of various cicadas, as the seventeen-year locust.
3. any of several North American trees belonging to the genus Robinia, of the legume family, especially R. pseudoacacia, having pinnate leaves and clusters of fragrant white flowers.
4. the durable wood of this tree.
5. any of various other trees, as the carob and the honey locust.

locust

/ ˈləʊkəst /

noun

1. any of numerous orthopterous insects of the genera Locusta, Melanoplus, etc, such as L. migratoria, of warm and tropical regions of the Old World, which travel in vast swarms, stripping large areas of vegetation See also grasshopper Compare seventeen-year locust
2. Also calledlocust treefalse acacia a North American leguminous tree, Robinia pseudoacacia, having prickly branches, hanging clusters of white fragrant flowers, and reddish-brown seed pods
3. the yellowish durable wood of this tree
4. any of several similar trees, such as the honey locust and carob

Derived Forms

• ˈlocust-ˌlike, adjective

Other Words From

• locust·like adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of locust¹

1150–1200; Middle English < Latin locusta grasshopper

Word History and Origins

Origin of locust¹

C13 (the insect): from Latin locusta locust; applied to the tree (C17) because the pods resemble locusts

Example Sentences

The migratory locust Locusta migratoria is an economically important crop pest that is said to have come to Egypt in the Old Testament as the eighth of the ten biblical plagues, "to devour all that plants that grow."

From Science Daily

The migratory locust is rarely found in Europe, but in Africa and Asia it not only causes millions of dollars' worth of damage but also has a deadly impact on local people, threatening their food and their very existence.

From Science Daily

The locust antennal lobe has a unique and unconventional neuronal architecture with more than 2000 spherical functional olfactory units, the glomeruli, whereas most other insects have only between 20 and 300 glomeruli in the antennal lobe.

From Science Daily

"Our goal was to solve the long-standing puzzle of how odors are encoded in the extremely large population of glomeruli, the structural and functional units in the antennal lobe of migratory locusts. This highly complex architecture of the locust antennal lobe has been observed for decades, but the underlying mechanisms of odor coding have remained a mystery due to the lack of suitable methods," says Xingcong Jiang, first author of the study.

From Science Daily

"Our results reveal an unusual functional ring-shaped organization of the antennal lobe consisting of specific glomerular clusters. This glomerular arrangement, which we could confirm by targeted genetic expression of a well-characterized olfactory receptor, is present throughout development, and the pattern of olfactory coding within the glomerular population is consistent at all developmental stages, from the first nymph stage to the adult locust," summarizes Silke Sachse, head of the Olfactory Coding Research Group at the Max Planck Institute, one of the study leaders.

From Science Daily

Related Words

• grasshopper