- singular of cyanobacteria.
cyanobacterium
Americannoun
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Any of a phylum of photosynthetic bacteria that live in water or damp soil and were once thought to be plants. Cyanobacteria have chlorophyll as well as carotenoid and phycobilin pigments, and they conduct photosynthesis in membranes known as thylakoids (which are also found in plant chloroplasts). Cyanobacteria may exist as individual cells or as filaments, and some species live in colonies. Many species secrete a mucilaginous substance that binds the cells or filaments together in colored (often bluish-green) masses. Cyanobacteria exist today in some 7,500 species, many of which are symbiotes, and have lived on Earth for 2.7 billion years. Since all species produce oxygen as a byproduct of metabolism, it is thought that much of Earth's atmospheric oxygen can be attributed to cyanobacteria. Many species can also fix nitrogen and so play an important role in the nitrogen cycle.
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Also called blue-green alga
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These observations permitted to identify N majensis as a fossil cyanobacterium.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 5, 2024
The two are forever on the trail of these composite symbiotic organisms, which they describe in the book as “an intensive cooperation between a fungus and an alga or a cyanobacterium, and sometimes all three.”
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 22, 2021
Some 2 billion years ago, a single-celled organism in Earth’s primeval ocean engulfed a mitochondrion and a cyanobacterium — and, now able to generate energy and photosynthesize, shunted off to change the world.
From Nature ● Apr. 2, 2019
But Chisholm has found hidden complexity within Prochlorococcus, a cyanobacterium that is the smallest, most abundant photosynthesizing cell in the ocean—responsible for 5% of global photosynthesis, by some estimates.
From Science Magazine ● Mar. 9, 2017
In contrast, the other algae—red, brown, golden, stramenopiles, and so on—all became photosynthetic by secondary, or even tertiary, endosymbiotic events; that is, they endosymbiosed cells that had already endosymbiosed a cyanobacterium.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2015
The largest forms resemble green or red algae, while the smaller fossils may represent algae, cyanobacteria, or sulfur-oxidizing bacteria.
From Science Daily ● May 12, 2026
The region also preserves some of the earliest evidence of life, including stromatolites and microbialite formations created by single-celled organisms such as cyanobacteria.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 21, 2026
Scientists estimate that cyanobacteria emerged around 2.9 billion years ago.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 18, 2026
The beauty of the sky contrasts sharply with the water, sometimes blue, but often a murky green from cyanobacteria or stained black.
From BBC ● Jan. 29, 2026
"Understanding stress-responsive biosynthesis in extremophilic cyanobacteria may accelerate industrial biotechnology for natural pigment and antioxidant production," says Prof. Kageyama when describing the motivation behind the work.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 13, 2026
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.
