chemosynthesis
noun
chemosynthesis is a noun meaning “The production of carbohydrates and other compounds from simple compounds such as carbon dioxide, using the oxidation of chemical nutrients as a…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled C-H-E-M-O-S-Y-N-T-H-E-S-I-S, and it appears about once in every 85 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of chemosynthesis is chemosyntheses.
What does chemosynthesis mean?
noun
- 1
The production of carbohydrates and other compounds from simple compounds such as carbon dioxide, using the oxidation of chemical nutrients as a source of energy rather than sunlight; it is limited to certain bacteria and fungi.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce chemosynthesis?
- US
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Wodencafe-chemosynthesis.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of chemosynthesis
- chemosyntheses plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is chemosynthesis?
Chemosynthesis appears about once in every 85 million words in written English, the 293,966th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Chemosynthesis in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense production of carbohydrates and other compounds from simple compounds:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | chimiosynthèse |
| German | Chemosynthese |
| Portuguese | quimiossíntese |
| Spanish | quimiosíntesis |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does chemosynthesis come from?
From chemo- + synthesis.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).