inositol

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun Any of nine isomeric alcohols, C₆H₁₂O₆·2H₂O, especially one found in plant and animal tissue and classified as a member of the vitamin B complex.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• noun (Physiol. Chem.) A white crystalline substance (C6H12O6) with a sweet taste, widely distributed in certain animal tissues and fluids, particularly in the muscles of the heart and lungs, and also in some plants, as in unripe pease, beans, potato sprouts, etc. Although isomeric with dextrose, it has no carbonyl (aldehyde or ketone) group, and is therefore not a carbohydrate, but a derivative of cyclohexane. Called also inosite, cyclohexitol, cyclohexanehexol, hexahydroxycyclohexane and phaseomannite. There are nine possible steroisomers, not all of which are found naturally. The predominate natural form is cis-1,2,3,5-trans-4,6-cyclohexanehexol, also called myo-inositol. The naturally occurring phytic acid in plants is the hexaphosphate of inositol, from which inositol may be manufactured; phytin is the calcium-magnesium salt of phytic acid. It is also a component of phosphatidylinositol.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun biochemistry any of several isomeric cyclic polyhydric alcohols, C6H12O6, found in both plant and animal tissue.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun an optically inactive alcohol that is a component of the vitamin B complex