Commissure also often refers to cardiac anatomy of heart valves. In the heart, a commissure is the area where the valve leaflets abut. When such an abutment is abnormally stiffened or even fused, valvular stenosis results, sometimes requiring commissurotomy.
It may refer to the junction of the upper and lower mandibles of a bird's beak,[1] or alternately, to the full-length apposition of the closed mandibles, from the corners of the mouth to the tip of the beak.[2]
It may refer to the nasal and temporal meeting points of the upper and lower eyelids (the medial and lateral canthi).
In the vulva, the joining points of the two folds of the labia majora create two commissures—the anterior commissure just anterior to the prepuce of the clitoris, and the posterior commissure of the labia majora, directly posterior to the frenulum of the labia minora and anterior to the perineal raphe.
In biology, the meeting of the two valves of a brachiopod or clam is a commissure; in botany, the term is used to denote the place where a fern's laterally expanded vein endings come together in a continuous marginal sorus.
