pro·tist

(prō′tĭst)

Any of numerous eukaryotic organisms that are not fungi, plants, or animals and are chiefly unicellular or colonial. Protists that are multicellular do not have cells differentiated into tissues. The protists include the protozoans, certain algae, oomycetes, and slime molds.

[From New Latin Prōtista, former kingdom name, from Greek prōtista, neuter pl. of prōtistos, the very first, superlative of prōtos, first; see per in Indo-European roots.]

pro·tis′tan (-tĭs′tən) adj. & n.

pro′tis·tol′o·gy (prō′tĭ-stŏl′ə-jē) n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

protistan - free-living or colonial organisms with diverse nutritional and reproductive modes

protist

microorganism, micro-organism - any organism of microscopic size

division Protista, Protista - eukaryotic one-celled living organisms distinct from multicellular plants and animals: protozoa, slime molds, and eukaryotic algae

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References in periodicals archive

Realtime PCR for detection and quantification of the protistan parasite Perkinsus marinus in environmental waters.

Production of specific pathogen-free larvae from genetically characterized populations of Anadara tuberculosa (Bivalvia), for stock enhancement and aquaculture in the Peru Northeast Biosphere Reserve

Preliminary note on the occurrence of a new protistan parasite, Dermocystidium marinum n.

TRACKING TRIPLOID MORTALITIES OF EASTERN OYSTERS CRASSOSTREA VIRGINICA IN THE VIRGINIA PORTION OF THE CHESAPEAKE BAY

Economic costs of protistan and metazoan parasites to global mariculture.

Planktonic Phases in Symbiotic Copepods: a Review

Simek, "Synergistic and antagonistic effects of viral lysis an protistan grazing on bacterial biomass, production and diversity," Environmental Microbiology, vol.

Bacterioplankton Activity in a Meso-eutrophic Subtropical Coastal Lagoon

Depicting more accurate pictures of protistan community complexity using pyro sequencing of Hypervariable SSU rRNA gene regions.

Sequence Amplicon Analysis of 18S rDNA Variable Regions (V3, V4 and V9) in Natural Strains of Sordaria fimicola and Response to Different Carbohydrates

and the protistan predator Oxyrrihs marina move more slowly in the presence of prey stimuli (Buskey and Stoecker 1989; Menden-Deuer and Grunbaum 2006).

Covering ground: Movement patterns and random walk behavior in Aquilonastra anomala sea stars

Seeberi is in fact a protistan parasite that cannot be cultured.

A clinicopathological study of cutaneous granuloma

Misuse of PCR assay for diagnosis of mollusk protistan infections.

Perkinsus sp. infecting the oyster Crassostrea rhizophorae from estuaries of the septentrional Northeast, Brazil/Perkinsus sp. infectando a ostra Crassostrea rhizophorae de estuarios do Nordeste setentrional, Brasil

Molecular Approaches for inferring evolutionary relationships among protistan parasites.

Neospora caninum en un rebano lechero y su asociacion con el aborto

Biologists Mark Farmer and Andrea Habura point out in their paper that unicellular protistan evolution lasted 1 billion years, providing the genomic diversity from which multicellular organisms arose during that remarkably fertile period.

When amoebas evolve: Myths of creationism

Seasonal occurrence and role of protistan parasites in coastal marine zooplankton.

Primer registro de la diatomea epibionte Pseudohimantidium pacificum y de otras asociaciones simbioticas en el Golfo de California