Ectoparasite

//ˌɛktə(ʊ)ˈpæɹəˌsaɪt// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A parasite that lives on the surface of a host organism; such as the Demodex mite, which lives in human hair and eyelashes.

    "Ordinarily, allergy to animals is due to either their fine dander which becomes aerosolized or to the exoskeleta, pupae, or feces of their ectoparasites."

  2. 2
    any external parasitic organism (as fleas) wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
ectozoanectozoonepizoanepizoon

Example

More examples

"Ordinarily, allergy to animals is due to either their fine dander which becomes aerosolized or to the exoskeleta, pupae, or feces of their ectoparasites."

Etymology

From ecto- (from Ancient Greek ἐκτός (ektós, “outside”)) + parasite.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.