VILLUS

[vil.lus] n, pl vil.li [NL, fr. L, tuft of shaggy hair--more at velvet] (ca. 1704): a small slender often vascular process: as a: one of the minute finger-shaped processes of the mucous membrane of the small intestine that serve in the absorption of nutriment b: one of the branching processes of the surface of the chorion of the developing embryo of most mammals that help to form the placenta