Etymology

prophage

P3R1O1P3H4A1G2E1

Today it means: The latent form of a bacteriophage in which the viral genome is inserted into the host chromosome. Full definition →

English phage ← Ancient Greek πρό (pró) ← Proto-Indo-European *pró
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*per-der.?
  2. Proto-Indo-European*pér
  3. Proto-Indo-European*pró
  4. Ancient Greekπρό (pró)
  5. Englishpro-
  6. Englishphage
  7. English todayprophage

From pro- + phage.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.