[ker.nel] n [ME, fr. OE cyrnel, dim. of corn] (bef. 12c) 1 chiefly dial: a fruit seed
2: the inner softer part of a seed, fruit stone, or nut
3: a whole seed of a cereal "a ~ of corn"
4: a central or essential part: germ "like many stereotypes ... this one too contains some ~s of truth --S. M. Lyman"
5: a subset of the elements of one set (as a group) that a function (as a homomorphism) maps onto an identity element of another set