Standard Lemma guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.
noun
Morbid matter created by a disease.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: obsolete
Topics: medicine, sciences
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Synonym of fomite: a substance able to communicate infection between people.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: archaic
Topics: medicine, sciences
Synonyms: fomite
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Anything which similarly facilitates the spread of something similarly deleterious.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: archaic, figuratively
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
genus of bracket fungi forming corky or woody perennial shelflike sporophores often of large size; includes some that cause destructive heartrot in trees
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: genus Fomes
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: fungus genus
History
From medical Latin fōmes (“fomite”), a figurative extension of its original sense of kindling, tinder, etc. Gradually supplanted in use by fomite, a mistaken backformation of its plural form fomites, from Latin fōmitēs.
