Filament

The word Filament, which is descended from Latin filum = "thread", is used in English for a variety of thread-like structures, including:

In commerce

• Fiber or, more loosely, yarn

In physics and electrical engineering

• An electrical filament in an incandescent light bulb
• Similarly, a thin heating element
• Current filament
• Filament propagation, diffractionless propagation of a light beam

In astronomy

• Galaxy filament, the largest known cosmic structures in the universe, thread-like structures that form the boundaries between large voids in the universe
• Solar filament, equivalent to a solar prominence
• Birkeland current, a specific magnetic field-aligned current in the Earth’s magnetosphere

In biology

• Myofilament, filaments of myofibrils constructed from proteins
• Protein filament, a long chain of protein subunits, such as those found in hair, muscle, or in flagella
• Part of a stamen, the male part of a flower
• A chain of cells connected end-to-end
• Hypha, a thread-like cell in fungi and Actinobacteria
• Filamentation, an elongation of individual bacterial cells
• Fine root hair on plants, natural fibers on plants, and other hair-like growths on plants

In media

• Filament (magazine), a female-oriented erotica magazine
• 2002 movie by Jinsei Tsuji
• Filament (band), a musical group from Japan that consists of Otomo Yoshihide and Sachiko M
• Filament Games, a Madison, Wisconsin based educational video game developer
• Filament Productions, a Production Design & Touring Video company based in Charlottesville, Virginia
• Filament (Song), Song by Yosei Teikoku

See also

• Monofilament (disambiguation)