Etymology

provirus

P3R1O1V4I1R1U1S1

Today it means: A virus genome, such as HIV, that integrates itself into the DNA of a host cell so as to be passively replicated along with the host genome. Full definition →

English virus ← Middle English virus ← Latin vīrus
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

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. Proto-Indo-European*weys-
  7. Proto-Indo-European*wisós
  8. Proto-Italic*weizos
  9. Latinvīrus
  10. Middle Englishvirus
  11. Englishvirus
  12. English todayprovirus

From pro- + virus.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.