Akademik

1. In anatomy, any structure resembling a w., e.g., the midline part of the cerebellum in the forms of “vermis” and “lumbrical.” 2. Term once used to designate any member of the invertebrate group or former subkingdom Vermes, a collective term no longer used taxonomically; now commonly used to designate any member of the separate phyla Annelida (the segmented or true worms), Nematoda (roundworms), and Platyhelminthes (flatworms). Important species include Dracunculus medinensis (dragon, guinea, Medina, or serpent w.), Enterobius vermicularis (seat w. or pinworm), Loa loa (African eye w.), Moniliformis (phylum Acanthocephala, thorny-headed worms), Oxyspirura mansoni (Manson eye w.), Pentastomida (tongue w.), Strongylus (palisade w.), Thelazia (eye w.), and Trichinella spiralis (pork or trichina w.). For some types of worms not listed as subentries here (because they are usually written as one word), see the full name. [A.S. wyrm]

- caddis w. aquatic larva in the insect order Trichoptera.

- Manson eye w. SYN: Oxyspirura mansoni.

- meal w. the larva of beetles of the genus Tenebrio; both larvae and adults are important pests, destroying flour, meal, and other cereal products; they are also intermediate hosts of nematodes of the genus Gongylonema, and of various tapeworms of the genus Hymenolepis.

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worm 'wərm n

1) any of various relatively small elongated usu. naked and soft-bodied parasitic animals (as of the phylum Platyhelminthes)

2) HELMINTHIASIS usu. used in pl. <a dog with \worms>

worm·like -.līk adj

worm vt to treat (an animal) with a drug to destroy or expel parasitic worms

any member of several groups of soft-bodied legless animals, including flatworms, nematode worms, earthworms, and leeches, that were formerly thought to be closely related and classified as a single group - Vermes.