noun.
In botany, a small, one-seeded, dry, indehiscent fruit, in which the thin seed-coat is adherent throughout to the very thin pericarp, as in wheat and all other cereal grains. Also spelled cariopsis.
the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
noun.
A one-celled, dry, indehiscent fruit, with a thin membranous pericarp, adhering closely to the seed, so that fruit and seed are incorporated in one body, forming a single grain, as of wheat, barley, etc.