microbe

English

Etymology

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

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈmaɪkɹəʊb/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈmaɪkɹoʊb/

  • Audio (California):

    (file)

• (Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈmaɪkɹoʊb/, [ˈmʌɪkɹoʊb]
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈmɑɪkɹəʉb/, /ˈmɑɪkɹɐʉb/
• (New Zealand) IPA^(key): /ˈmaɪkɹɐʉb/

Noun

microbe (plural microbes)

1. (microbiology) Any microorganism; (loosely, nonscientifically) especially, a harmful bacterium.
   • 2015 March 13, Ben Brumfield, “You may be your germs: Microbe genes slipped into human DNA, study says”, in CNN‎:

     We humans and other complex animals are full of microbes, gajillions of them. People have so many that microbe cells living in our bodies outnumber our own vastly.

   • 2019 October 7, Sandee LaMotte, “The germiest place in your home and the best way to combat those microbes”, in CNN‎:

     Yes, there are microbes everywhere and most are just fine for us, perhaps even beneficial to our microbiomes and immune systems. We don’t care about those.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:microorganism

Derived terms

• antimicrobe
• microbeless
• microbial
• microbian
• microbic
• microbicide
• microbiosis
• microbism
• microbivore
• microbivorous
• mimivirus
• nanobe
• pseudomicrobe
• radiobe
• supermicrobe

Related terms

• microorganism

Descendants

• → Welsh: microb

Translations

microorganism

Afrikaans: mikrobe Albanian: mikrob (sq) m Arabic: مِيكْرُوب m (mīkrūb), جُرْثُوم m (jurṯūm) Armenian: մանրէ (hy) (manrē), միկրոբ (hy) (mikrob) Assamese: অণুজীৱ (onuziw), জীৱাণু (ziwanu) Asturian: microbiu (ast) m Azerbaijani: mikrob (az) Belarusian: мікро́б m (mikrób) Bengali: জীবাণু (bn) (jibanu) Bulgarian: микро́б (bg) m (mikrób) Burmese: ပိုး (my) (pui:) Catalan: microbi m Chinese: Mandarin: 微生物 (zh) (wēishēngwù) Czech: mikrob (cs) m Danish: mikrobe Dutch: microbe (nl) m or f Esperanto: mikrobo Estonian: mikroob Finnish: mikrobi (fi) French: microbe (fr) m Galician: microbio (gl) m Georgian: მიკრობი (ka) (miḳrobi) German: Mikrobe (de) f Greek: μικροοργανισμός (el) m (mikroorganismós), μικρόβιο (el) n (mikróvio) Hebrew: חַידַק (he) m (haydak) Hindi: सूक्ष्मजीव (sūkṣmajīv) Hungarian: mikroba (hu) Icelandic: örvera f Ido: mikrobo (io) Indonesian: mikrob (id) Ingrian: mikroba Interlingua: microbio Irish: miocrób Italian: microbo (it) m, microbio (it) m Japanese: 微生物 (ja) (びせいぶつ, biseibutsu) Kazakh: микроб (mikrob) Khmer: អតិសុខុមប្រាណ (km) (ʼaʼtesokhomĕəʼpraan), មីក្រុប (miikrop), មេរោគ (mei rook), ក្រមី (km) (krɑməy), ជីវាណូ (ciivaanou), ពីជៈ (piicĕəʼ) Korean: 미생물(微生物) (ko) (misaengmul) Kurdish: Central Kurdish: میکرۆب (mîkrob) Northern Kurdish: mikrob, mîkrob (ku) f Kyrgyz: микроб (mikrob) Lao: ຈຸນລະຊີບ (lo) (chun la sīp), ຈຸລິນສີ (chu lin sī), ຈຸລິນທີ (chu lin thī) Latvian: mikrobs m Lithuanian: mikrobas m Macedonian: микроб m (mikrob) Maori: moroiti Mongolian: нян (mn) (njan) Norwegian: Bokmål: mikrobe Persian: میکروب (fa) (mikrob) Polish: drobnoustrój (pl) m, mikrob (pl) m, mikroorganizm (pl) m, zarazek (pl) m Portuguese: micróbio (pt) m Romanian: microb (ro) m Russian: микро́б (ru) m (mikrób) Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: мѝкро̄б m Roman: mìkrōb (sh) m Slovak: mikrób m Slovene: mikrob m Spanish: microbio (es) Swedish: mikrob (sv) c Tagalog: mikrobyo Tajik: микроб (mikrob) Thai: จุลชีพ (th) (jun-lá-chîip), จุลินทรีย์ (th) (jù-lin-sii) Turkish: mikrop (tr) Turkmen: mikrob Ukrainian: мікро́б m (mikrób) Urdu: جَرْثُومَہ m (jarsūmā) Uyghur: مىكروپ (mikrop) Uzbek: mikrob (uz) Vietnamese: vi trùng (vi), vi khuẩn (vi), vi sinh vật (vi) (微生物) Volapük: mikröb Yiddish: מיקראָב (mikrob)

Anagrams

• Crombie

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from French microbe, from Ancient Greek μικρός (mikrós, “small”) and βίος (bíos, “life”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌmiˈkroː.bə/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: mi‧cro‧be

Noun

microbe f (plural microben or microbes, diminutive microbetje n)

1. (microbiology) microbe

Derived terms

• microbisch

French

Etymology

From Ancient Greek μικρός (mikrós, “small”) and βίος (bíos, “life”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mi.kʁɔb/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Audio (Switzerland (Valais)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

Noun

microbe m (plural microbes)

1. (microbiology) microbe

Descendants

• → English: microbe
  • → Welsh: microb
• → Persian: میکروب (mikrob)
• → Romanian: microb
• → Spanish: microbio
  • → Tagalog: mikrobyo
• → Turkish: mikrop

Further reading

• “microbe”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.