Word.ws English Dictionary

medusavirus

medusavirus noun: a giant virus infecting amoebae causing them to shrivel and harden.

Noun

medusavirus (plural medusaviruses)

  1. A giant virus infecting amoebae causing them to shrivel and harden.
    • Here, we report the novel features of medusavirus, a large DNA virus newly isolated from hot spring water in Japan.2019 February 6, Genki Yoshikawa et al., “Medusavirus, a Novel Large DNA Virus Discovered from Hot Spring Water”, in Journal of Virology, →DOI
    • On the other hand, medusavirus-infected amoeba cells show moderately decreased cell motility later than those of mimivirus-infected cells and change the cells to a cyst-like formation.2020 January 17, Sho Fukaya et al., “Kinetic Analysis of the Motility of Giant Virus-Infected Amoebae Using Phase-Contrast Microscopic Images”, in Frontiers in Microbiology, →DOI

Proper noun capitalized: Medusavirus

Medusavirus

  1. An informal genus of the informal family Medusaviridae, large DNA viruses that infect amoeba.
    • The newest giant virus is Medusavirus, so named because of the way it infects amoebas, single-celled organisms that commonly live in water.2019 March 20, Sarah Zhang, “Beware the Medusavirus”, in The Atlantic
    • Many of the NCLDVs, including the phycodnavirus Paramecium bursaria Chlorella virus (PBCV-1), the iridovirus Chilo iridescent virus (CIV), the mimivirus Cafeteria roenbergensis virus (CroV), or the giant amoeba-infecting Faustovirus, Pacmanvirus, and Medusavirus, present large icosahedral capsids...2019 October 24, German Andrés et al., “The cryo-EM structure of African swine fever virus unravels a unique architecture comprising two icosahedral protein capsids and two lipoprotein membranes”, in...

Forms of medusavirus

pluralmedusaviruses

Origin of medusavirus

From Ancient Greek Μέδουσα (Médousa, “Medusa”) + -virus. From Latin virus (“virus”). From being a virus which can turn amoeba into stone-like cysts. From Medusa, the Greek mythological figure which could petrify people with a glance.

From Ancient Greek Μέδουσα (Médousa, “Medusa”) + virus. From Latin virus (“virus”). From being a virus which can turn amoeba into stone-like cysts. From Medusa, the Greek mythological figure which could petrify people with a glance.

Questions about medusavirus

What does medusavirus mean?
Medusavirus means a giant virus infecting amoebae causing them to shrivel and harden.
What part of speech is medusavirus?
Medusavirus can be a noun or a proper noun.
What is the plural of medusavirus?
The plural of medusavirus is medusaviruses.

Words near medusavirus in the dictionary

  1. medusahead
  2. medusal
  3. Medusalike
  4. medusan
  5. medusas
  6. medusavirus
  7. medusaviruses
  8. Medusean
  9. medusian
  10. medusians
  11. medusiferous

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: medusavirus (page history and authors); Medusavirus (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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Cite this entry: “medusavirus.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/medusavirus. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.