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/ˈpæɹəˌsaɪt/ · noun
(biology) An organism that lives on or in another organism of a different species, deriving benefit from living on or in that other organism, while not contributing towards that other organism sufficiently to cover the cost to that other organism..
Lice, fleas, ticks, and mites are widely spread parasites.
...and the mistletoe crept round many of the oaks—that pleasant parasite, whose associations belong rather to the hearth and lighted hall than to its native branches.
It is likely that the long evolutionary trajectory of Mycoplasma went from a reductive autotroph to oxidative heterotroph to a cell-wall–defective degenerate parasite. This evolutionary trajectory assumes the simplicity to complexity route of biogenesis, a point of view that is not universally accepted.
A royalist who publicly called for a military intervention to protect the parasite monarchy.
Of all the corrupting effects of wealth there is none worse than this, that it makes the wealthy (and their parasites) think in some way divine, or at least a lovely character of the mind, what is in truth nothing but their power of luxurious living.
Her golden tresses shade / The bosom's stainless pride, / Curling like tendrils of the parasite / Around a marble column.
[…] parasiting and aerial refueling as range-extension measures. Second, parasiting would be exorbitantly expensive, because each parasite bomber would need its own carrier. Two bombers could be serviced by a single tanker, however,[…]
parasite display
Use parasite when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.
Parasite means (biology) An organism that lives on or in another organism of a different species, deriving benefit from living on or in that other organism, while not contributing towards that other organism sufficiently to cover the cost to that other organism..
Common synonyms include bloodsucker, bludger, bummer, freeloader.
Possible antonyms include commensal, mutualist, sometimes symbiote, host.
Lice, fleas, ticks, and mites are widely spread parasites.
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