anopheles
English
WOTD – 20 August 2025
Etymology
Borrowed from New Latin Anopheles (“genus of mosquitoes”), coined by the German entomologist Johann Wilhelm Meigen (1764–1845),[1] from Ancient Greek ἀνωφελής (anōphelḗs, “unprofitable, useless; hurtful, prejudicial”),[2] from ἀν- (an-) (a variant of ᾰ̓- (ă-, prefix forming terms having senses opposite to stems or terms to which it is attached)) + ὄφελος (óphelos, “advantage, benefit, good”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₃bʰel-) + -ης (-ēs, suffix forming third-declension adjectives).
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /əˈnɒfɪliːz/
- (General American) IPA(key): /əˈnɑfəliz/
Audio (Southern England): (file) - Hyphenation: an‧o‧phel‧es
Noun
anopheles (plural anopheles)
- (entomology, loosely, also attributive) A mosquito of the genus Anopheles, some insects of which transmit various parasites of the genus Plasmodium that are the cause of malaria.
- Coordinate term: culex
- 1901 May 24, H[erbert] Watkins-Pitchford, “Horse-sickness Investigations (Continued)”, in The Agricultural Journal and Mining Record, volume IV, number 6, Maritzburg: The Times Printing and Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 162, column 1:
- Analogy with the malaria-carrying mosquito points to the various kinds of anopheles, and perhaps to some species of the ordinary mosquito or culex, as being possible bearers of the disease.
- 1915 July 10, G[eorge] Bernard Shaw, “Doctors’ Delusions. Sanitation versus Inoculation.”, in Doctors’ Delusions, Crude Criminology, and Sham Education, Standard edition, London: Constable and Company, published 1931 (1950 printing), →OCLC, pages 128–129:
- [T]he whole business was a silly mistake due to a murderous-mouthed ignorance of the ease with which the same result could have been obtained by inoculation with anopheles vaccine and stegomyia emulsion.
- 1983, Lawrence Durrell, “The Return Journey”, in Sebastian: Or Ruling Passions […] ([The Avignon Quintet; 4]), London; Boston, Mass.: Faber and Faber, →ISBN, page 155:
- They slept again, then woke, and drowsed their way slowly towards the late afternoon when the unexpected fever awoke in him—an onslaught so sudden that the symptoms for her seemed instantly recognisable as a rogue attack of malaria. […] "I brought it back from the desert—they have been planting rice like fools, and now you get anopheles right up to the gates of Alexandria!"
Usage notes
If the word is used as a genus name, by convention it should be capitalized and italicized as Anopheles.
Derived terms
Related terms
Translations
mosquito of the genus Anopheles
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References
- ^ Johann Wilhelm Meigen (1818), “Gabelmükke ANOPHELES”, in Systematische Beschreibung der bekannten Europäischen zweiflügeligen Insekten [Systematic Description of the Known European Two-winged Insects] (in German), volume I, Aachen, North Rhine-Westphalia: Friedrich Wilhelm Forstmann, →OCLC, page 10: “Gabelmükke ANOPHELES [section heading]”
- ^ “anopheles, n.”, in OED Online , Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2024; “anopheles, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
Further reading
- Anopheles on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
- Anopheles on Wikispecies.Wikispecies