Parasite
['pærəsaɪt]
Definition
(noun.) an animal or plant that lives in or on a host (another animal or plant); it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting or killing the host.
Typist: Tabitha--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) One who frequents the tables of the rich, or who lives at another's expense, and earns his welcome by flattery; a hanger-on; a toady; a sycophant.
(n.) A plant obtaining nourishment immediately from other plants to which it attaches itself, and whose juices it absorbs; -- sometimes, but erroneously, called epiphyte.
(n.) A plant living on or within an animal, and supported at its expense, as many species of fungi of the genus Torrubia.
(n.) An animal which lives during the whole or part of its existence on or in the body of some other animal, feeding upon its food, blood, or tissues, as lice, tapeworms, etc.
(n.) An animal which steals the food of another, as the parasitic jager.
(n.) An animal which habitually uses the nest of another, as the cowbird and the European cuckoo.
Checked by Godiva
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. Sycophant, flatterer, toady, fawner, wheedler, flunky, spaniel, lickspittle, pick-thank, toad-eater, time-server, hanger-on.
Edited by Bryan
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Sycophant, flatterer, toady, courtier, toad-eater, timeserver
ANT:Detractor, calumniator, traducer
Edited by Cecilia
Definition
n. one who frequents another's table: a hanger-on: a sycophant: (bot.) a plant growing upon and nourished by the juices of another: (zool.) an animal which lives on another—its host.—adjs. Parasit′ic -al like a parasite: fawning: acting as a sycophant: living on other plants or animals.—adv. Parasit′ically.—ns. Parasit′icalness; Parasit′icide that which destroys parasites; Par′asitism; Parasitol′ogist; Parasitol′ogy.
Edited by Enrico
Examples
- It was one of the parasite streets; long, regular, narrow, dull and gloomy; like a brick and mortar funeral. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- Farewell, dear Amelia--Grow green again, tender little parasite, round the rugged old oak to which you cling! William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- The dependency of one organic being on another, as of a parasite on its prey, lies generally between beings remote in the scale of nature. Charles Darwin. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
- Nor have you, O poor parasite and humble hanger-on, much reason to complain! William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- The dark bean-shaped cells are the normal blood corpuscles, and the few speckled cells are those infested with the malarial parasites. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- The illustrations represented in Fig. 177 show the parasites that cause malaria, or fever and ague. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- Commencing his great work about 1865 with the investigation of the silk worm plague in France, he discovered it to be due to parasites, and checked it. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
Edited by Ivan