Word.ws English Dictionary

coccolithophore

coccolithophore noun: any of many minute mostly marine planktonic biflagellated organisms with brown chromatophores and complex calcareous, less commonly siliceous, shells.

Noun

coccolithophore (plural coccolithophores)

  1. Any of many minute mostly marine planktonic biflagellated organisms with brown chromatophores and complex calcareous, less commonly siliceous, shells.
    • Chalk formations such as the white cliffs of Dover are largely composed of the bodies of countless billions of coccolithophores that bloomed, died and then sank to the seabed each season for millions of years.2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 290
    • It was filled with a kind of golden-brown planktonic algae known as coccolithophores, whose skeletons would form the chalks that underlie parts of Britain, Belgium and France today.2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: The First 100 Million Years, Penguin, published 2019, page 27

Forms of coccolithophore

pluralcoccolithophores

Origin of coccolithophore

From Ancient Greek κόκκος (kókkos, “grain, seed”) + λίθος (líthos, “stone”) + φόρος (phóros, “carry”); this compound references how the phytoplanktonic organism's life cycle results in the depositing of its microscopic seed-like calcic exoskeleton, forming calcite.

Words formed from coccolithophore

Questions about coccolithophore

What does coccolithophore mean?
Coccolithophore means any of many minute mostly marine planktonic biflagellated organisms with brown chromatophores and complex calcareous, less commonly siliceous, shells.
What part of speech is coccolithophore?
Coccolithophore is a noun.
What is the plural of coccolithophore?
The plural of coccolithophore is coccolithophores.

Words near coccolithophore in the dictionary

  1. coccolite
  2. coccolites
  3. coccolith
  4. coccolithic
  5. coccolithogenesis
  6. coccolithophore
  7. coccolithophores
  8. coccolithophorid
  9. coccolithophoride
  10. coccolithophorides
  11. coccolithophorids

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: coccolithophore (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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