AUTOTOMY

autotomy

(noun) spontaneous removal or casting off of a body part (as the tail of a lizard or claw of a lobster) especially when the organism is injured or under attack

Source: WordNet® 3.1

Etymology

Noun

autotomy (countable and uncountable, plural autotomies)

(chiefly zoology) The spontaneous removal of a limb, tail etc, especially by some invertebrates as a self-defense mechanism.

Hyponyms

• tail-shedding

Source: Wiktionary