noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   An organism whose cell (or cells) are characterized by the absence of a nucleus or any other membrane-bound organelles.
2. 2
   a unicellular organism having cells lacking membrane-bound nuclei; bacteria are the prime example but also included are blue-green algae and actinomycetes and mycoplasma wordnet
3. 3
   In the two-empire system of biological taxonomy, an organism of the kingdom Prokaryotae (now superseded).

Synonyms

All synonyms

procaryoteprokaryotaprokaryota

Antonyms

All antonyms

eukaryote

Etymology

From pro- + karyon + -ote.

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