mycoderma
Meanings
noun
- One of the forms in which microbes group themselves; a (microscopic or macroscopic) layer of motionless but living microbes united on the surface of the fluid in which they are developed, differing from the zoogloea stage by not having the intermediate mucous substance.
- A single microbe of (former) genus Mycoderma, as a denizen within a biofilm; a microscopic colony of such microbes, among many such colonies in a biofilm.
noun
- Mucous membrane (mucosa).
Word forms
Etymology
Nineteenth century. Appellativization from genus name Mycoderma, which was coined in 1822 as a scientific name for the putative genus of organisms in mother of vinegar; they were named thus under the belief that they were fungi (although in fermentation there may also be bacteria present besides the yeast), hence the combining form myco- (for more, see Wikipedia); by surface analysis, myco- + derma, where the latter component refers to the "skin" formed on fermenting liquid.
Related words
Previous
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.