inserted

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of insert.

   The surgeon inserted a thin tube into the vein.

   A new clause was inserted into the contract before signing.

   Note

   A regular verb, so one -ed spelling does both jobs. It is the plain past in she inserted the key, and the participle after have or in the passive in a clause was inserted. Because insert is transitive, the passive comes easily: something is inserted into or between something else. The same spelling also serves as the botanist's adjective for how organs attach.

2. 2
   adjective

   Attached to or growing out of some part of a larger structure, as one organ joined to another.

   The stamens are inserted near the base of the corolla.

   In this species the petals are inserted just below the ovary.

   Similarattached

   Note

   A botanist's word of position: it says where one organ joins another, so it rarely stands alone and nearly always takes a phrase of place, as in inserted near the base or inserted below the ovary. It does not grade, so nothing is more inserted than something else. Despite the verb-like shape, nothing was put in. The stamen grows from the point described rather than being placed there.

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