Word.ws English Dictionary

subbacterial

subbacterial adjective: smaller than a bacterium.

Adjective

subbacterial (not comparable)

  1. smaller than a bacterium
    • They are used frequently for the separation of particles of sub-bacterial dimensions and for the study of the sizes of the particles of ultramicroscopic viruses, bacteriophage and colloids.1939, Hans Zinsser, A textbook of bacteriology^([archive.org]), page 916
    • Diseases that have most stubbornly resisted medical control are those caused by the subbacterial Rickettsiae and viruses. Cause of many tropical diseases, these organisms are the smallest living things. They can exist only side living cells.1944 May 1, “Tropical Diseases”, in Life^([archive.org]), page 64
  2. Subacute and bacterial.

Origin of subbacterial

From sub- + bacterial.

Questions about subbacterial

What does subbacterial mean?
Subbacterial means smaller than a bacterium.
What part of speech is subbacterial?
Subbacterial is an adjective.

Words near subbacterial in the dictionary

  1. subaxillary
  2. subaxolemmal
  3. Subayon
  4. Subačius
  5. Subba
  6. subbacterial
  7. subbacteriochlorin
  8. subbag
  9. subbags
  10. subbailiff
  11. subbailiffs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: subbacterial (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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