zoologist
Americannoun
-
zoologists
plural
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of zoologist
Explanation
A zoologist is a scientist who studies animals. Zoologists are experts on everything about animals, from their cells to the history of their evolution. If you love and are fascinated by animals, you might decide to become a zoologist. Your major in college will probably be zoology, which is a branch of biology focusing on all animals — even those that are extinct. A zoologist may end up doing research, or work as a zookeeper in a zoo. Zoologist shares a root with zoology, the Latin zoologia, which combines the Greek words zoion, "animal," and logia, "study."
Vocabulary lists containing zoologist
Turtles All the Way Down
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UCPS 6th Grade Roots List #16
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Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Suffixes: -ist
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Contrary to what some may think, birds cannot always easily flee the dangers of war, zoologist Ewa Wegrzyn, from the Polish University of Rzeszow, said.
From Barron's ● May 20, 2026
Dr Michel Dugon, a zoologist at the University of Galway, said the figures are "interesting" but "not surprising".
From BBC ● Apr. 13, 2026
What all of this does not mean, according to zoologist Arik Kershenbaum of the University of Cambridge, is that dogs grasp the meaning of language.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 3, 2026
He knew things no other zoologist did because of his proximity to the whales and keen eye.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 29, 2024
You could become a zoologist, a biologist, an anthropologist, or an ecologist.
From "My Life with the Chimpanzees" by Jane Goodall
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Until the 1960s, Ms. Horn writes, most zoologists had “studied only specimens on cold tables, or broken creatures in shackles or cages.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 8, 2026
A zoo is celebrating the birth of a giant anteater pup, which zoologists say is "considered the most threatened mammal in Central America".
From BBC ● Apr. 1, 2026
The zoologists concentrated on young workers that had not yet undertaken any learning walks.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 13, 2024
At this stage, co-authors Darya Krupenko and Aleksei Miroliubov, invertebrate zoologists at Saint Petersburg University, suspected this enigmatic conglomerate might be a parasite.
From Science Magazine ● Sep. 21, 2023
There has been, for many years, a running battle among jungle zoologists as to just which of the giant snakes is the biggest.
From "The Princess Bride" by William Goldman
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.