microbe

UK/ˈmaɪkɹəʊb/US/ˈmaɪkɹoʊb/

nounB2+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #12,501 of 15,258neutral

Other forms: microbes

A microbe is a living thing too small to see without a lens. Kill the microbes.

Most are harmless and many are necessary, which is why killing all of them is a bad idea. A human body carries about as many microbe cells as human ones.

Definitions of microbe

1nounmicrobeA living thing too small to see without a lens.B2+
“One microbe in the water supply closed the whole system.”

microbe is an organism.

Where it comes from

French microbe was coined in 1878 from Greek mikros, small, plus bios, life.

Ancient Greek
μικρός — small
French
microbe
English, today
microbe

Built from

βίος · Ancient Greek — life

French microbe, from Ancient Greek μικρός (“small”) and βίος (“life”). by surface analysis, micro- + -obe.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

microbe in the wild

A microorganism, or microbe, is an organism of microscopic size, which may exist in its single-celled form or as a colony of cells.
Microorganism
Pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) are small molecular motifs conserved within a class of microbes, but not present in the host.
Pathogen-associated molecular pattern
Many groups of single-celled, microscopic organisms, or microbes, possess the ability to enter this dormant state.
Microbial cyst
Human interactions with microbes include both practical and symbolic uses of microbes, and negative interactions in the form of human, domestic animal, and crop diseases.
Human interactions with microbes
A state microbe is a microorganism used as an official state symbol.
State microbe

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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