Definition of "contractibility" [con•tract•i•bil•i•ty]

• The quality or degree of being contractible. (noun)

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• "Rough and repulsive in appearance, and sluggish in habit, it has great power of contractibility."
• "The four properties of irritability, contractibility, assimilation, and reproduction, belong to these vital units -- the cells, and it is these properties which we are trying to trace to their source as a foundation of vital activity."
• "Cells are endowed with the properties of irritability, contractibility, assimilation and reproduction, and it is thus plainly to the study of cells that we must look for an interpretation of life phenomena."