Noun: fomite
| Singular | fomite |
| Plural | fomites |
Sample Sentences
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This must be an efficacious fomite of cutaneous and pectoral disease. [1859, Richard Francis Burton, “The Lake Regions of Central Equatorial Africa...”, in Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, number 29, page 134:]
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Alternatively, such fluids may be transferred from soiled hands to fomites, or airborne organisms may impinge or settle onto fomite surfaces. Fomites may also serve as a site for the replication of a pathogen, as in the case of enteric bacteria in household sponges or dishcloths. [2009, Raina M. Maier et al., Environmental Microbiology, page 559:]
Nouns inflected like fomite
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
A back-formation from fomites, plural of fomes, a borrowing of medical Latin fōmes (“tinder, kindling”), used figuratively to evoke the analogy of a spreading infection to a spreading fire. See: Latin Nouns '
fōmes'.
Verbs referencing "fomite"
Finnish Nouns
fomiitti.