disperser en · NOUN
Etymology
Etymology tree English disperse Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzios Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English disperser From disperse + -er.
Meanings
- A substance that stabilizes a dispersion; an emulsifier.
- A particular kind of bipartite graph.
-
An organism that disperses something, such as seeds, in the environment.
Ants are integral components of terrestrial ecosystems, owing to their manifold interactions with other organisms. They serve as seed dispersers for plants (myrmecochory), mutualists with sap-sucking insects (trophobionts), and hosts for a wide range of associate organisms (myrmecophiles) and act as both predator and prey.
2022 September 19, Schultheiss et al., “The abundance, biomass, and distribution of ants on Earth”, in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, page 1, column 1:Nesting data from dispersers and nondispersers came from the same set of colonies and were thus directly comparable.
1996, Charles R. Brown, Mary Bomberger Brown, Coloniality in the Cliff Swallow:
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| dispersers | Number=Plur | lexicographic |