noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   The early study of biology, before it became a rigorous established discipline. uncountable
2. 2
   The study of very small biological structures, such as ultraviruses and bacteriophages uncountable

Etymology

From proto- + biology.

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