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Glite Dictionary
single-celled

single-celled

8 4.3
A living thing made of only one cell, for example an amoeba
  • adjective
  • /ˈsɪŋɡəlˌsɛld/
  • Specialized
translation icon : unicelular
  • The egg is a single-celled organism, around since the first single-celled creatures evolved more than three billion years ago.
  • a single-celled organism
  • a single-celled creature

And so it is reverting to a single celled lifestyle.

Examples

  • Do you not read about the single-celled organism being found?

    Blog text (6)

  • We know there are single-celled organisms and that they evolved into more complex multicellular organisms.

    Blog text (26)

  • Simple single-celled creatures were around for a billion years with almost no change.

    Blog text (14)

  • How the incredible diversity of plants and animals has evolved from single-celled beings over the last 3.6 billion years.

    Academic text (2009)

  • The organisms of interest are psychrophilic and thermophilic bacteria and archaea, single-celled organisms that fall between the bacteria and eukaryotes.

    Academic text (1994)

  • Chemical energy for marine benthic systems is often provided by single-celled and chain-forming phytoplankton (algae), which are the dominant primary producers in the ocean.

    Academic text (2000)

  • Many scientists believe that the first life forms on Earth were single-celled organisms that thrived in the oceans.

  • When the sperm fertilizes the egg, it forms a single-celled organism that will eventually grow into a complex life form.

  • According to research, around 3.4 billion years ago, the planet was dominated by single-celled microbial life.

Synonyms

one-celled
vssingle-celled
  • Specialized
2 4.4

A living thing that has only one cell

is the everyday hyphenated form used in general descriptions
unicellular
vssingle-celled
  • Specialized
1 5.3

A living thing that has only one cell

is the more common hyphenated term used in general speech

How Many Cells

multicellular
  • Specialized
3 4.3
single-celled
  • Specialized
8 4.3

Surface Forms

single-celled positive

Morphology

single-celled = single + cell (transparent) = single + cell + ed

The compound combines 'single' and 'cell' with a standard adjectival '-ed' to mean 'having one cell', which is directly inferable from the parts.

Etymology

Single-celled combines single ('one') and cell, which comes from Latin cella meaning 'small room' because early scientists thought the tiny parts in plants looked like little rooms under a microscope. So a single-celled living thing is 'made of one cell', which is why the word means a creature with only one cell.