Word Type

Noun

The word "bacteria" can be used as a noun.

Word Relationships

Typical Location

finger ground lake mouth petri dish septic tank water

Capable Of

make people sick spread disease

Causes

infection in cut stink

Derived Terms

Archaebacteria Archebacteria Eubacteria bacterialess bacterin bacteriosis bacteriuria bacterivore bacterize green non-sulfur bacteria green sulfur bacteria pseudobacteria purple bacteria slime bacteria spherobacteria

Derived From

a

Distinct From

virus

Etymologically Related To

peg

Inflected/Variant Forms

bacterium

Context

medicine microbiology

Has Property

alive benign and do not cause disease harmful microscopic very small

Broader Terms (Hypernyms)

micro-organism microorganism

Type Of (IsA)

everywhere microorganism microscopic organisms one cause of illness organism prokaryotes prokaryotic

Receives Action

killed

Related Terms

culture

Related Terms

amoeba animal anti anti soap bacillus back back tear bacterium causes causes sickness cell coccus culture disease germ germs kitchen kitchen surfaces microbiology microorganism microscopic microscopic animal one cell organism prokaryote sickness single single cell small soap surfaces tear tiny tiny organism virus

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