Chem. [f. TUNIC + -IN1.] A kind of animal cellulose, C6H10O5, or chitin, occurring in the mantles of tunicates.
1862. Miller, Elem. Chem. (ed. 2), III. 781. Berthelot calls it [chitin] tunicin, from its entering into the composition of the envelope of some of the tunicate mollusks.
1876. trans. Schützenberger’s Ferment., 147. Derived … from the decomposition of a substance analogous to tunicin or chitin.
