Microbiology

How to spell microbiology

12 letters · 6 syllables

How to pronounce microbiology

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does microbiology mean?

1. nounThe branch of science concerned with microorganisms such as bacteria, viruses and fungi.

Microbiology in a sentence

• She studied microbiology before training as a clinical lab technician.

• The hospital microbiology department identified the bacteria within hours.

Where does microbiology come from?

Language of origin: Greek

Microbiology is a modern scientific compound assembled from Greek building blocks. The first part, micro-, comes from the Greek mikros, meaning 'small' or 'little', the same element that gives us microscope and microbe. The middle part comes from bios, the Greek word for 'life', which also sits inside biology, biography and antibiotic. The final part, -logy, comes from logia, meaning 'the study of' or 'a body of knowledge', derived from logos, meaning 'word' or 'reasoning'. The word was coined in the nineteenth century, after improved microscopes let scientists such as Pasteur and Koch examine organisms too small for the naked eye, so the literal sense, 'the study of small life', describes the discipline exactly. Remembering that it is built from micro plus bio plus logy helps keep the joins in the spelling clear.

How the word is built

• micro- (small)
• bio (from bios: life)
• -logy (from logia: study of)