protamine
/ˈpɹoʊ.təˌmin/noun
protamine is a noun meaning “Any of various strongly basic proteins of relatively low molecular weight that are rich in arginine and are found associated especially with DNA in…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled P-R-O-T-A-M-I-N-E and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 42 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of protamine is protamines.
What does protamine mean?
noun
- 1
Any of various strongly basic proteins of relatively low molecular weight that are rich in arginine and are found associated especially with DNA in place of histone in the sperm cells of various animals (such as fish).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce protamine?
- UK /ˈpɹəʊ.tə.miːn/
- US /ˈpɹoʊ.təˌmin/
Protamine has 3 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of protamine
- protamines plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is protamine?
Protamine appears about once in every 42 million words in written English, the 199,120th 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).
Protamine in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense Translations:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| Portuguese | protamina |
| Spanish | protamina |
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 protamine come from?
From prot- (“original”) + -amine.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).