cryptomonad

9.9

A tiny single-celled living thing like algae that lives in fresh or salt water and often makes green blooms

noun
/ˌkrɪptoʊˈmɒnæd/

Specialized

: criptomona

While exploring the pond, we observed that the water was filled with cryptomonads, creating a vibrant green hue.

Examples

The researcher collected samples of cryptomonads from the lake to investigate their role in the algal bloom.
Cryptomonads are important components of aquatic ecosystems, serving as a food source for various small marine animals.
You ended up with these eukaryotes that were swallowed by other things to become cryptomonads or chlorophyll AC bearing algae.

Synonyms

cryptophyte

vscryptomonad

Specialized

1 9.9

Single-celled algae that live in fresh or salt water and often form large growths near shores

is the scientific phylum term for the same microscopic single celled algae

Surface Forms

cryptomonad singular

cryptomonads plural

Morphology

cryptomonad = monad (opaque) = crypto + monad

Although the word is formally built from crypto- plus monad, the biological taxonomic meaning is not readily recoverable for an average learner from those parts alone.

Etymology

Cryptomonad comes from Greek parts crypto- meaning 'hidden' and monad meaning 'single'. Think of cryptic ('hidden') and the prefix mono- in monotone ('one'), so a cryptomonad is a tiny, single-celled alga that is usually hidden until it forms a visible bloom.