Precursor

//pɹɪˈkɜː.sə// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    That which precurses: a forerunner, predecessor, or indicator of approaching events.

    "Oxygen levels on Earth skyrocketed 2.4 billion years ago, when cyanobacteria evolved photosynthesis:[…]. The evolutionary precursor of photosynthesis is still under debate, and a new study sheds light. The critical component of the photosynthetic system is the “water-oxidizing complex”, made up of manganese atoms and a calcium atom."

  2. 2
    something that precedes and indicates the approach of something or someone wordnet
  3. 3
    One of the compounds that participates in the chemical reaction that produces another compound.
  4. 4
    a person who goes before or announces the coming of another wordnet
  5. 5
    a substance from which another substance is formed (especially by a metabolic reaction) wordnet
Adjective
  1. 1
    Caused by the following symbol. not-comparable

Synonyms

All synonyms
forerunnerharbingeradvance guardagentairheadalterant

Example

More examples

"Domestic corn's wild precursor was teosinte."

Etymology

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle English precursour, from Middle French precurseur or its etymon Latin praecursor (“forerunner”). By surface analysis, precurse + -or.

Etymology 2

From pre- + cursor.

Related phrases

precursor enzymeprecursor tipchemical compoundchemical reaction

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