Neuroscience
Dendrite
The branching extensions of a neuron that receive signals from other neurons. Dendrites are the input side of a neuron, collecting information from many sources.
Biological Context
Dendrites have tree-like branching patterns (the name comes from Greek for 'tree'). A single neuron may have thousands of dendritic branches, each receiving input from different sources. This architecture allows neurons to integrate information from many inputs before deciding whether to fire.
Business Application
Organizational dendrites are the information-gathering structures—market research, customer feedback systems, competitive intelligence. Like neural dendrites, they collect signals from many sources for integration and decision-making.