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: a cooperative relationship (as between two persons or groups)

the symbiosis ... between the resident population and the immigrants - John Geipel

Symbiosis was adopted by the scientific community in the late 1800s, though it had appeared in English in a non-scientific sense as far back as 1622. When a biological symbiosis is mutually beneficial, it is termed "mutualism." For example, when the yucca moth lays her eggs in the seed pods of the yucca, she acts as pollinator, and when the larvae hatch they feed on some, but not all, of the seeds. When one organism lives off another at the other's expense, it's called "parasitism." Either way, living together is what "symbiosis" is all about; the word came to us, via German and New Latin, from the Greek symbiōsis, meaning "state of living together." "Symbiōsis," in turn, traces to "symbios" ("living together"), a combination of syn-, meaning "with," and bios, meaning "life."

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'symbiosis.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

borrowed from German Symbiose, borrowed from Greek symbíōsis "living together, companionship," from symbiō-, variant stem of symbioûn "to live with, live together" (from sym- sym- + bioûn "to live, pass one's life," derivative of bíos "life") + -sis -sis - more at quick entry 1

Note: As a term in life sciences German Symbiose was promulgated, if not introduced, by the mycologist Heinrich Anton de Bary (1831-88) in Die Erscheinung der Symbiose: Vortrag gehalten auf der Versammlung der Deutscher Naturforscher und Aertze zu Cassel (Strassburg, 1879); a portion of the lecture appeared earlier as "Ueber Symbiose" in Der Naturforscher, 11. Jahrgang, No. 43, October 26, 1878, pp. 400-04. He defines the word briefly as "the living together of differently denominated organisms" ("[das] Zusammenleben ungleichnamiger Organismen," p. 5). De Bary was probably aware of the slightly earlier synonymous term Symbiotismus, introduced by the plant pathologist Albert Bernhard Frank (1839-1900) in "Ueber die biologischen Verhältnisse des Thallen einiger Krustenflechten," Beiträge zur Biologie der Pflanzen, Band 2 (1877), p. 195.

1877, in the meaning defined at sense 1

The first known use of symbiosis was in 1877

More from Merriam-Webster on symbiosis

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I went to the ______ store to buy a birthday card.

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a cooperative relationship (as between two persons or groups) the symbiosis ... between the resident population and the immigrants - John Geipel Symbiosis was adopted by the scientific community in the late 1800s, though it had appeared in English in a non-scientific sense as far back as 1622.

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