Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Spore |
SporeNoun1. Small usually single-celled reproductive body produced especially by certain bacteria and algae and fungi and nonflowering plants. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "spore" was first used: 1836. (references) |
Etymology: Spore \Spore\, noun. [Greek expression sowing, seed, from to sow. Compare to Sperm.]. (Websters 1913) |
| Domain | Definition |
Biology & Biotechnology | A reproductive body, characteristic particularly of the lower plants, consisting of one or a few cells and never containing an embryo. Source: European Union. (references) |
| In higher plants, a specialised cell generally produced by meiosis which by further division produces gametes. Source: European Union. (references) | |
Food & Agriculture | Muscardine is a fungus disease which kills the worm quickly. The silkworm's body is white and covered with --. Source: European Union. (references) |
Mining | Part of the reproduction organs of many coal measures' plants. There are two kinds, namely, megaspores (female) and microspores (male). They are found in most coal seams, particularly the dull layers. Megaspores vary from 1 to 5 mm in size, and microspores (or pollen grains) from about 0.01to 0.1 mm. (references) |
Science | A general term for a reproductive structure in fungi, bacteria and cryptogams, often 1-celled; the analogue of seeds in flowering plants. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Spores are diaspores (dispersal units) of fungi, ferns, fern allies, and some other plants, but they also can be resting stages in the life cycles of some animals and bacteria. Spores can be formed sexually or asexually, and many different kinds of spores exist. The chief difference between spores and seeds is that spores have very little stored food resources compared with seeds, and thus require more favorable conditions in order to germinate successfully. In compensation, spores are very hardy, and many can survive years in dry conditions.
In the case of spore-shedding vascular plants such as ferns, wind distribution of very light spores provides great capacity for dispersal. Also, spores are less subject to animal predation than seeds because they contain almost no food reserve, however they are more subject to fungal and bacterial predation. Their chief advantage is that, of all forms of progeny, spores require the least energy and materials to produce.
Vascular plant spores are always haploid and vascular plants are either homosporous or heterosporous. Plants that are homosporous produce spores of the same size and type. Heterosporous plants, such as spikemosses, quillworts, and some aquatic ferns produce spores of two different sizes: the larger spore effectively functioning as a female spore and the smaller functionally male.
See also: sporangium.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Spore."
| The following table is compiled from various sources, across various languages. When English abbreviations or acronyms come from a non-English source, this is noted. | |||
| Entry | Source | Expression | Field |
SPORE | English | Specialized program of research excellence | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |||
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Pulverulence | Powder, dust, sand, shingle; sawdust; grit; meal, bran, flour, farina, rice, paddy, spore, sporule; crumb, seed, grain; particle. (smallness); limature, filings, debris, detritus, tailings, talus slope, scobs, magistery, fine powder; flocculi. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | There goes my spore theory! (Taxi; writing credit: Grahame Bond; Jim Burnett) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Music |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Bacillus spp. Malachite Green spore stain, at a 1000x magnification. Credit: CDC. |  | Photomicrograph of Bacillus anthracis from an agar culture demonstrating spores; Fuchsin-methylene blue spore stain. Anthrax. Credit: CDC. |
 | Microbiologist Mark Jackson checks dried spore preparations of the fungus Paecilomyces fumosoroseusafter removal from a small, commercial-scale freeze-dryer. P. Credit: USDA ARS News; photo by Keith Weller.. |  | Moss with spore capsulesBryophyte. Credit: Roger Rosentreter. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | It takes more irradiation to kill a bacterial spore, with D-values on the order of 2.8 kiloGray. (references) | |
Microbes are killed by heat. If food is heated to an internal temperature above 160oF, or 78oC, for even a few seconds this sufficient to kill parasites, viruses or bacteria, except for the Clostridium bacteria, which produce a heat-resistant form called a spore. (references) | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Spore" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 92.31% of the time. "Spore" is used about 26 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 92.31% | 24 | 71,196 |
| Lexical Verb (infinitive) | 3.85% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 3.85% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 26 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| The following table summarizes the usage of "spore" based on a population census conducted in the United States. Ranks and frequencies are based on all names reported and classified. |
| Name | Usage/Gender | Usage per 100 million Persons | Rank in USA |
| Spore | Last name | 300 | 26,025 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits. | |||
Expressions using "spore": Brand spore ♦ resting spore ♦ spore case ♦ spore formation ♦ spore fruit ♦ spore mother cell ♦ spore sac. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "spore": spore-bearing, spore-forming, spore-producing. | |
Ending with "spore": AK-Spore, swarm-spore. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "spore"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | spore. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | غبيرة, بوغ, بذرة (germ, grain, kernel, pip, seed, seedling, sowing, sperm). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | спора. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 孢子 . (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | spora, výtrus. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | sporeform (resistant dormant body), spore (calcar, inking, spores, spur, stake), hvileform (resistant dormant body). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | spore (spores). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | هاگ اوردن , هاگ , تخم میکروب , تخم قارچ . (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | itiö (spores). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | spore (spores). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | Spore. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | έχω σπόρουσ, σπόριον,σπόρος, σπόριο, σπόροσ φυτού μη ανθούντοσ, σποριάζω (seed). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | ב' (germ, sprout). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | spóra, csíra (chit, embryo, germ, ovum, rudiment, seed, sprout). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | spora (spores). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Kanji | 胞子 . (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Katakana | がほう (art of drawing and painting, illustrated news magazine, pictorial), ほうし (attendance, bonze, Buddhist priest, enshrine, inquiring about, kindness, licentious, self-indulgent, service). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | sporrag, spore. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | orespay esporo. (various references) spor (abundance, addition, advancement, benefit, gain, germ, growth, headway, increase, increment, progress, use). (various references) спора. (various references) pòr (pore of the skin, race, seed). (various references) spora. (various references) espora. (various references) spor. (various references) spor (sport, sporting, sports), kaynak (authorship, basis, beginning, birth, bottom, chapter and verse, context, font, fount, fountain, fountain-head, fund, genesis, grass roots, headspring, inquiries, origin, parent, paternity, principle, provenance, quarter, reserve, resource, rise, root, root stock, roots, seeds, source, source material, source of supply, spring, weld, welding, well, wellhead, wellspring, womb), köken (authorship, basis, bedrock, beginning, birth, derivation, descent, etymon, extraction, genesis, lineage, origin, origination, paternity, pedigree, principle, provenance, radical, root, seeds, spring, wellhead, wellspring, womb). (various references) спора. (various references) mầm mống. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Greek | 700 BCE-300 CE | spora. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "spore": spored, spores. (additional references) | |
Words ending with "spore": aeciospore, arthrospore, ascospore, basidiospore, blastospore, carpospore, chlamydospore, diaspore, endospore, exospore, megaspore, microspore, oospore, teleutospore, teliospore, tetraspore, urediniospore, urediospore, uredospore, zoospore, zygospore. (additional references) | |
Words containing "spore": aeciospores, arthrospores, ascospores, basidiospores, blastospores, carpospores, chlamydospores, diaspores, endospores, exospores, megaspores, microspores, oospores, teleutospores, teliospores, tetraspores, urediniospores, urediospores, uredospores, zoospores, zygospores. (additional references) | |
| |
"Spore" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Msboro, psor, psora, sapore, saporo, siore, skore, slore, sparre, specre, sphor, spira, spireb, spirem, spiri, splore, spoe, spone, spooge, spope, spor, spored, spork, sporn, sporren, spose, spote, spre, sprou, spuare, spuere, spura, spure, spurre, suore. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "spore" (pronounced spô"r) |
| 3 | -p ô" r | outpour, pore, pour, rapport. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
Direct Anagrams: pores, poser, prose, repos, ropes. | |
| Words within the letters "e-o-p-r-s" | |
-1 letter: epos, eros, opes, ores, peso, pore, pose, pros, repo, reps, roes, rope, rose, sore. | |
-2 letters: ers, oes, ope, ops, ore, ors, ose, per, pes, pro, rep, res, roe, ser, sop. | |
-3 letters: er, es, oe, op, or, os, pe, re, so. | |
| Words containing the letters "e-o-p-r-s" | |
+1 letter: copers, corpse, dopers, ephors, gropes, hopers, lopers, mopers, operas, osprey, pareos, pedros, person, poiser, pokers, polers, porose, posers, poseur, posher, poster, powers, presto, probes, proems, proles, prosed, proser, proses, proves, rebops, repose, repots, repros, respot, ropers, sloper, soaper, splore, spored, spores, stoper, topers, tropes, uprose. | |
+2 letters: apposer, boppers, coopers, copiers, coppers, copters, corpses, crepons, croupes, deports, deposer, dorpers, elopers, esparto, exports, exposer, forceps, gophers, gropers, hoopers, hoppers, imposer, leprose, leprosy, leprous, loopers, loppers, moppers, oosperm, oospore, openers, operons, operose, opposer, oppress, orpines, ospreys, oversup, paroles, pelorus, periods, perrons, persona, persons, petrols, petrous, plessor, plexors, plovers, plowers, poisers, polders, pollers, ponders, poorest, poppers, porches, porgies, porkers, porkies, porters, poseurs, postern, posters, posture, pothers, potters, potzers, pourers, pouters, powders, powters, preshow, presoak, presold, presong, presort, pressor, prestos, pretors, probers, process, profess, profuse, projets, prolegs, promise, propels, propers, propose, prosect, prosers, prosier, prosper, prosses, prossie, prostie, proteas, protest, proteus, provers, prowess, prowest, proxies, purpose, pyrones, pyropes, recoups, redtops, reopens, replots, repolls, reports, reposal, reposed, reposer, reposes, reposit, repours, respoke, respond, respots, riposte, rompers, ropiest, saprobe, scooper, seaport, semipro, serpigo, shopper, slopers, snooper, soapers, soapier, soppier, soupier, splores, spoiler, sponger, spoofer, spoored, sported, sporter, sporule, spotter, spouter, stomper, stooper, stopers, stopper, strophe, supremo, swooper, thorpes, toppers, trompes, troupes, uphroes, uprouse. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Crosswords 3. Usage: Modern 4. Usage: Commercial | 5. Images: Slideshow 6. Images: Photo Album 7. Quotations: Non-fiction 8. Usage Frequency | 9. Names: Frequency 10. Expressions 11. Expressions: Internet 12. Translations: Modern | 13. Translations: Ancient 14. Abbreviations 15. Acronyms 16. Derivations | 17. Rhymes 18. Anagrams 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
