APHID

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does aphid mean? 

• APHID (noun)
  The noun APHID has 1 sense:

1. any of various small plant-sucking insects

  Familiarity information: APHID used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• APHID (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Any of various small plant-sucking insects

Classified under:

Nouns denoting animals

Hypernyms ("aphid" is a kind of...):

louse; plant louse (any of several small insects especially aphids that feed by sucking the juices from plants)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "aphid"):

Aphis pomi; apple aphid; green apple aphid (bright green aphid; feeds on and causes curling of apple leaves)

Aphis fabae; bean aphid; blackfly (blackish aphid that infests e.g. beans and sugar beets)

greenfly (greenish aphid; pest on garden and crop plants)

ant cow (excretes a honeylike substance eaten by ants)

woolly aphid; woolly plant louse (secretes a waxy substance like a mass of fine curly white cotton or woolly threads)

Holonyms ("aphid" is a member of...):

Aphidoidea; superfamily Aphidoidea (plant lice)

 Context examples 

When an environment becomes too crowded with other aphids, females produce offspring with wings, rather than wingless offspring.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

Ladybirds are natural predators of aphids, a primary cotton pest that greatly reduces crop yields.

(Study estimates true value of ladybird as biocontrol, SciDev.Net)

"But some aphids are more sensitive to crowding than others. Figuring out why is key to understanding how this textbook example of phenotypic plasticity works."

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

The researchers used techniques from evolutionary genetics and molecular biology to identify genes that determine the degree to which aphids respond to crowding.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

As many gardeners know, aphids can quickly overwhelm and kill the host plants on which they live and feed.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

Pea aphids are insects that reproduce rapidly and typically give birth to offspring that don't have wings.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

Scientists identified genes that influence whether aphids produce wingless or winged offspring.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)

Biologists Jennifer Brisson of the University of Rochester and Benjamin Parker of the University of Tennessee studied pea aphids and uncovered genes that influence whether aphids produce wingless or winged offspring in response to their environment.

(Virus genes help determine if pea aphids get wings, National Science Foundation)