choanoflagellate

English

Etymology

From choano- +‎ flagellate.

Noun

choanoflagellate (plural choanoflagellates)

  1. (biology) Any of a group of flagellate protozoa, of the class Choanoflagellatea, thought to be the closest unicellular ancestors of animals.
    • 2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 30:
      Choanoflagellates are plankton: tiny protozoans that feed on even tinier bacteria.
    • 2017 August 1, Douglas Fox, “Aliens in our midst”, in Aeon‎:
      Detailed studies showed that the sponge and the cells of a protist called a choanoflagellate used a different set of genes and proteins to build similar-looking structures.

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