choanoflagellate en · NOUN
Etymology
Etymology tree English choano- Latin flagellō Proto-Indo-European *-tós Proto-Italic *-tos Latin -tus Latin flagellātuslbor. English flagellate English choanoflagellate From choano- + flagellate.
Meanings
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Any of a group of flagellate protozoa, of the class Choanoflagellatea, thought to be the closest unicellular ancestors of animals.
Choanoflagellates are plankton: tiny protozoans that feed on even tinier bacteria.
2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 30:Detailed studies showed that the sponge and the cells of a protist called a choanoflagellate used a different set of genes and proteins to build similar-looking structures.
2017 August 1, Douglas Fox, “Aliens in our midst”, in Aeon, archived from the original on 26 May 2019:
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| choanoflagellates | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Synonyms
Translations (5)
fi kaulussiimaeliö (any of a group of flagellate protozoa) · pl wiciowiec kołnierzykowy (any of a group of flagellate protozoa) · pt coanoflagelado (any of a group of flagellate protozoa) · cmn 領鞭毛蟲 /领鞭毛虫 (any of a group of flagellate protozoa) · es coanoflagelado (any of a group of flagellate protozoa)