foraminifera

en-noun

foraminifera (plural foraminifera or foraminiferas)

foraminifera (plural)
foraminiferas (plural)

/ˌfɒɹəmɪˈnɪfəɹə/

/ˌfɒɹəmɪˈnɪfɹə/

/fəˌɹæmɪˈnɪf(ə)ɹə/

/fəˌɹæməˈnɪf(ə)ɹə/

Adolphe-Théodore Brongniart
Alcide d’Orbigny
Annales des sciences naturelles
Jean Victor Audouin
Jean-Baptiste Dumas

Learned borrowing from New Latin Foraminifera (subphylum name), from French foraminifère (“foraminifer, foraminifera”), from French Foraminifères, coined by the French naturalist Alcide d’Orbigny (1802–1857) in an 1826 article. Foraminifère is derived from Latin forāmina (“apertures, holes”) + -fer (“-bearing”).

der

This elegant Foraminifera has long been one of the best known of recent species; in its young state it is one of the most abundant organisms in the Cuban sand: in this immature form it appears a Foraminifera of the ordinary spiral type; […]

1850, J. W., “Proceedings of the Microscopical Society of London. [Report of William Crawford Williamson’s paper “On the Minute Structure of the Calcareous Shells of Some Recent Species of Foraminifera”.]”, in Edward Newman, editor, The Zoologist: A Popular Miscellany of Natural History, volume VIII, London: John Van Voorst, […], →OCLC, page 2685

By the slow accumulation of dead shells, corals, &c., cemented by the smaller tests of foraminifera, the Coralline Crag eventually attained a thickness of fifty feet.

1872, J[ohn] E[llor] Taylor, “The Story of the ‘Crags’”, in M[ordecai] C[ubitt] Cooke, editor, Hardwicke’s Science-Gossip: An Illustrated Medium of Interchange and Gossip for Students and Lovers of Nature, volume XIII, number 84, London: Robert Hardwicke, […], →OCLC, page 272, column 1

The best method of examining chalk for minute Foraminifera is this: […] The balsam gradually penetrates into the cells, the black rings of the air-bubbles disappear, and the minute, frequently very elegant cells of the Foraminifera become visible.

1875, J. W. Griffith, Arthur Henfrey, “CHALK”, in J. W. Griffith, Martin Duncan, M[iles] J[oseph] Berkeley, T[homas] Rupert Jones, editors, The Micrographic Dictionary; a Guide to the Examination and Investigation of the Structure and Nature of Microscopic Objects, 3rd edition, volume I (Text), London: John Van Voorst, […], →OCLC, page 154, column 1

Several forms were met with [at 2,800 fathoms] which apparently do not occur on the surface, particularly a number of species of a group which is so far as we know entirely undescribed. It seems to be intermediate between the Radiolarians and the Foraminiferas, resembling the former in the condition and appearance of the sarcode and in the siliceous composition of the test, and the latter in external form.

1875 November 25, “The Work of the Challenger”, in Nature: A Weekly Illustrated Journal of Science, volume XIII, number 317, London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published 1876, →OCLC, page 70, column 2

Careful preparation of a fragment of chalk usually brings to light remains, sometimes well preserved, of foraminifera (Rotalina ornata, Cristellaria rotulata, Globigerina bulloides).

1879, A. Ge., “GEOLOGY”, in The Encyclopædia Britannica: A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and General Literature, 9th edition, volume X, Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, →OCLC, page 358, column 1

Yet more wonderful and beautiful than the Amœbas are the Rhizopoda called Foraminiferas. The hard word Foraminifera means to carry an aperture or opening, and is used as the name of an immense number of tiny creatures living in thin shells with openings in them, though which the inhabitants send out the threads all Rhizopoda have the power of making from the substance of their bodies.

1882, N[ancy] D’Anvers [pseudonym; Nancy Regina Emily Meugens Bell], Lowest Forms of Water Animals: An Illustrated Natural History Reader (Science Ladders; V), New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons […], →OCLC, pages 12–13

Backboneless animals precede those with backbones and the minute foraminifera—bits of jelly in shells—species with a more complex organisation.

1890, “Geographical Distribution of Living Beings: Plants; Limiting Agents”, in Robert Brown, editor, Our Earth and Its Story: A Popular Treatise on Physical Geography, London, Paris: Cassell & Company, […], →OCLC, page 270, column 1

He then passed to the beds next in succession in the series, and exhibited some beautiful photographic prints of their Oolitic structure, as seen under the microscope, shewing tubules growing round a nucleus, generally a fragment of a calcareous organism—in some cases an entire one, as a Foraminifera—but whether the tubules were of animal or vegetable origin, he was not prepared to say.

1893 May 5, W. C. Lucy, “Annual Address to the Cotteswold Naturalists’ Field Club at Gloucester, May 5th, 1893”, in Proceedings of the Cotteswold Naturalists’ Field Club, volume XI, Gloucester, Gloucestershire: […] John Bellows, published 1895, →OCLC, page 6

The articles are diatoms, spiculas, foraminiferas, and polycystines mounted on microscope slides. They […] are claimed to be exempt from duty as specimens of natural history under paragraph 712. […] We find that the goods are specimens of natural history imported as objects of science, and sustain the protest.

1894 August 21, Wilkinson, general appraiser, “Specimens of Natural History on Microscope Slides, Free”, in Synopsis of the Decisions of the Treasury Department and Board of United States General Appraisers on the Construction of the Tariff, Navigation, and Other Laws for the Year Ending December 31, 1894 (15310–G.A. 2744), Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, published 1895, →OCLC, page 730

In addition to mollusks, foraminiferas, coralline algæ, and echinoids have contributed to the formation of the rock [Key Largo limestone].

1913, Samuel Sanford, “Southern Florida”, in George Charlton Matson, Samuel Sanford, Geology and Ground Waters of Florida […] (United States Geological Survey Water-supply Paper; 319), Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 188

On the Caroline Ridge (present water depth 2900 to 3000 meters) radiolarians are more numerous in the Oligocene and Lower Miocene than in the Middle and Upper Miocene. Also, either radiolarians or planktonic foraminiferas predominate in some layers. If radiolarians predominate, then the foraminiferas are impoverised in their specific composition.

1971 February, Valeri A. Krasheninnikov, “Cenozoic Foraminifera”, in Alfred G[eorge] Fischer et al., Initial Reports of the Deep Sea Drilling Project […], volume VI, Washington, D.C.: National Ocean Sediment Coring Program, National Science Foundation; U.S. Government Printing Office, →OCLC, part II (Shore Laboratory Studies), pages 1067–1068

Constructed in a modular manner, each chamber of a foraminifera is preformed with an organic layer that subsequently mineralizes.

2005, H. C. W. Skinner, A. H. Jahren, “Biomineralization”, in William H. Schlesinger, editor, Biogeochemistry (Treatise on Geochemistry; 8), Amsterdam, Boston, Mass.: Elsevier, section 8.04.3.4.4. (Foraminifera), page 139, column 2

Some foraminifera also have dinoflagellates living within their tissues that aid in growth through photosynthesis. These foraminifera are much like sophisticated satellites that open their solar panels at daybreak. In the morning, the foraminifera transport the algae out of their shells to the ends of their spines and gooey arms[…]. There, the dinoflagellates capture sunlight and grow through photosynthesis; in the process they use up the foraminiferas' wastes while producing oxygen. As darkness falls, the algae are are drawn back inside the foraminiferas' shells. Thousands of symbiotic algae may be housed within a foraminifera’s tissues, making it a floating, dense packet of productivity.

2011, Ellen [J.] Prager, “The Invisible Crowd”, in Sex, Drugs, and Sea Slime: The Oceans’ Oddest Creatures and Why They Matter, Chicago, Ill., London: University of Chicago Press, page 5

In the Bay of Prony, a foraminifera, Operculina philippinensis, is abundant in the fraction > 0.5 mm where it can compose up to 65% of the assemblages.

2012, Jean-Pierre Debenay, A Guide to 1,000 Foraminifera from Southwestern Pacific New Caledonia, Marseille: IRD Éditions; Paris: Publications Scientifiques du Muséum, page 38, column 2

Synonym of foraminifer (“any of a large group of aquatic amoeboid protists of the subphylum Foraminifera, characterized by streaming granular ectoplasm that among other things is used for catching food, often with a calcareous shell with many holes through which pseudopodia protrude”)


foram

Some forams allow single-celled algae to lodge on the surface of their bodies, rather as tropical coral do.

2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 291


foraminifer

/ˌfɒɹəˈmɪnɪfə/

/ˌfɔɹəˈmɪnəfɚ/

Borrowed from French foraminifère (“foraminifer, foraminifera”), from French Foraminifères, coined by the French naturalist Alcide d’Orbigny (1802–1857) in an 1826 article. Foraminifère is derived from Latin forāmina (“apertures, holes”) + -fer (“-bearing”).

The species of foraminifer which composes, almost to the exclusion of all others, the deep Atlantic mud, is called Globigerina. […] The natural home of the foraminifers appears to be in the deeper parts of the ocean, commencing where the regular inhabitants of limited depths terminate.

1859 October, “Art. V.—Physical Geography of the Atlantic Ocean.”, in The Westminster Review, American edition, volume LXXII, number CXLII, New York, N.Y.: Leonard Scott & Co., […], →OCLC, page 263

The Heterostegina-bed at Malta is not without smaller Foraminifers (some of which we can identify,—as the Globigerina bulloides, Truncatulina lobatula, &c.), but the matrix is too stubborn to yield all its treasures.

1860 January 4, T[homas] Rupert Jones, W[illiam] K[itchen] Parker, “3. On the Rhizopodal Fauna of the Mediterranean, Compared with that of the Italian and Some Other Tertiary Deposits.”, in The Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, volume XVI, part I (Proceedings of the Geological Society), London: Longmans, Green, Longmans, and Roberts […], →ISSN, →OCLC, page 300

From a palæontological point of view the only part of a Foraminifer with which we have to deal is the shell or "test," […] Each bud of the compound Foraminifer is surrounded by its own shell, so that the whole comes to be composed of a number of chambers, each containing a mass of sarcode.

1872, Henry Alleyne Nicholson, “Sub-kingdom I.—Protozoa.”, in A Manual of Palæontology for the Use of Students […], 3rd edition, Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, part II, page 61

The environmental significance of foraminifer abundance variations in Arctic cores is controversial[…]. One interpretation concludes that foraminifer-rich intervals represent interglacial conditions reflecting seasonally absent or reduced ice cover leading to increased productivity; intervals barren or nearly barren of foraminifers are considered to represent glacial conditions with thicker ice cover and lower productivity[…].

1994, Richard Z. Poore, Scott E. Ishman, R. Lawrence Phillips, David H. McNeil, “Paleoceanography”, in Quaternary Stratigraphy and Paleoceanography of the Canada Basin, Western Arctic Ocean […] (U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin; 2080), Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 10, column 1

A cross-section through a single agglutinated foraminifer – in this case, one that selected both carbonate and non-carbonate grains to build its test. These foraminifers are recognizable by the chamber-shaped grain arrangements rather than the otherwise random distribution of grains in the rest of the rock.

2003, Peter A. Scholle, “Grains: Skeletal Fragments: Foraminifers”, in A Color Guide to the Petrography of Carbonate Rocks: Grains, Textures, Porosity, Diagenesis (AAPG Memoir; 77), Tulsa, Okla.: American Association of Petroleum Geologists, page 37

One of the most frequently asked questions concerns the predators of planktic foraminifers. Whereas a large variety of predators of benthic foraminifers have been identified, the nature of planktic foraminifer predators is largely enigmatic.

2017, Ralf Schiebel, Christoph Hemleben, “Nutrition, Symbionts, and Predators”, in Planktic Foraminifers in the Modern Ocean, 2nd edition, Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer Nature, →DOI, section 4.6 (Predation), page 154, column 1

Any of a large group of aquatic amoeboid protists of the subphylum Foraminifera, characterized by streaming granular ectoplasm that among other things is used for catching food, often with a calcareous shell with many holes through which pseudopodia protrude.

foraminifero

aquatic amoeboid protist of the subphylum Foraminifera


foraminiferan

/fəˌɹamɪˈnɪfəɹən/

Eocene foraminiferans are very different from Pliocene ones, and even within the Eocene there are many fine time divisions that can be recognised using foraminifera.

2004, Richard Fortey, The Earth, Folio Society, published 2011, page 146

(zoology, paleontology) An organism of the phylum Foraminifera; a foraminifer.


nodosarine

(zoology) Any foraminifer of the genus Nodosaria or allied genera.


rotalite

(paleontology, archaic) Any fossil foraminifer of the family Rotaliidae, abundant in chalk formations.


fusulinid

Any of the Fusulinidae., an extinct family of fusulinacean Foraminifera.


alveolinid

(biology) Any foraminifer in the family Alveolinidae.


miliolid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the order Miliolida.


rotaliid

(zoology) Any foraminiferan of the order Rotaliida


nummulitid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the family Nummulitidae.


globigerinid

(zoology) Any of the Globigerinida (a synonym of the Globigerinina), a rotaliid suborder of foraminiferans found as marine plankton.


orbitolinid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the family Orbitolinidae.


nonion

Any foraminifer of the family Nonionidae.


cibicidid

For example, closely related cibicidids living on thicker carbonate substrates, like C.

2015 July 18, “Population Dynamics and Parasite Load of a Foraminifer on Its Antarctic Scallop Host with Their Carbonate Biomass Contributions”, in PLOS ONE, →DOI

Any foraminifer of the family Cibicididae


peneroplid

Any foraminifera of the family Peneroplidae.


quinqueloculinid

Any foraminifera of the genus Quinqueloculina


uvigerinid

Any foraminifer of the family Uvigerinidae.


bolivinid

(zoology) Any foram in the family Bolivinidae.


lagenid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the family Lagenidae.


textulariid

Any foraminiferan in the order Textulariida.


ataxophragmiid

(zoology) Any any of the foraminifers in the family Ataxophragmiidae.


hormosinid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the family Hormosinidae.


lituolid

(zoology) Any foraminifer in the family Lituolidae.


spiroplectamminid

(zoology) Any foram in the family Spiroplectamminidae.


trochamminid

(zoology) Any foram in the family Trochamminidae.


planulinid

Accessory benthic foraminiferal events reported by Berggren and Miller (1989) to occur in the late Eocene are the migrations into the bathyal realm from the neritic realm of planulinids and siphoninids.

2003, Donald R. Prothero, From Greenhouse to Icehouse: The Marine Eocene-Oligocene Transition

(zoology) A foraminifer of the family Planulinidae.


siphoninid

(zoology) A foraminifer of the family Siphoninoidea.


gavelinellid

(zoology) A foraminifer of the family Gavelinellidae.


hemigordiopsid

Any foraminifer in the family Hemigordiopsidae.


elphidiid

Any foraminifer of the family Elphidiidae


orbitoid

The larger orbitoid Foraminifera of the Western Hemisphere are very inadequately known, yet their occurrence in great numbers has been noted in many papers during the last three- quarters of a century.

1918, Joseph Augustine Cushman, “Orbitoid Foraminifera of the genus Orthophragmina from Georgia and Florida”, in David White, editor, Shorter Contributions to General Geology, 1917, page 115

The orbitoids are larger foraminifera. Their tests are radial hyaline and perforate with a discoidal growth pattern, i.e. the chambers are arranged in rings.

1983, Ulrich Lehmann, Fossil Invertebrates, page 30

Any foraminifer of the family Orbitoididae.


fusulinoidean

Any foraminifer of the superfamily Fusulinoidea


neoschwagerinid

Any foraminifer of the family Neoschwagerinidae


staffellid

Any foraminifer of the family Staffellidae


granuloreticulosan

Any foraminifer of the class Granuloreticulosa


heterosteginid

Any foraminifer of the genus Heterostegina


igorinid

Any foraminifer of the extinct genus †Igorina


globorotaliid

Any foraminifer of the family Globorotaliidae


foraminiferum

The third is a conglomerate of very minute tuff-grains, each enveloping a nucleus which proved on examination to be either a foraminiferum, a mollusk or, more rarely, a rounded particle of semi-transparent quartz.

1852, W[illiam] F. Lynch, “Reconnaissance of Route from the Bŭqâ’ at ’Ain Lijjy to Beirût”, in Official Report of the United States’ Expedition to Explore the Dead Sea and the River Jordan, Baltimore, Md.: […] John Murphy & Co., […], page 105

Mr. Hammond felt something of this practical education as he stood watching the dissolution of the grey chalk cliffs on the horizon, as the earthly kingdom, with its surging, struggling millions, its royalty and intellect, splendour and wisdom, had become but a faint outline on the narrow sea of a small quarter of a globe—itself only an orange in the universe. The whole concern merely a foraminiferum of creation.

1870, Lucius O’Brien Blake, “Un ami de Voyage”, in Rich and Rare, a Tale of Anglo-Italian Life, volume I, London: T. Cautley Newby, […], page 12

For of course, if this foraminiferum, living in a medium of fine chalk-grains, used those chalk-grains for the construction of its shell, it acquires a calcareous habitus, especially, after the diagnetic processes, it was subject to, during its fossilisation.

1932, Carel Peiter Issac van Rijsinge, Description of Some Foraminifera of a Boring Near Bunde (Dutch South-Limburg): […], page 17

Movements of intracellular particles along the lamellipodium formed by the foraminiferum Allogromia laticollaris.

1988, Alexander D. Bershadsky, Juri M. Vasiliev, “Rotational Movements of Organelles and Cytoplasm”, in Philip Siekevitz, editor, Cytoskeleton (Cellular Organelles), New York and London: Plenum Press, →DOI, page 177

Foraminifera are single-cell microcrustaceans with a calcareous shell, which is a shell made of calcium carbonate. When a foraminiferum dies, its shell sinks onto the seabed.

2002, “The Neanderthals”, in Andy Klatt, transl., The Neanderthal’s Necklace: In Search of the First Thinkers, Four Walls Eight Windows, translation of El collar del neandertal by Juan Luis Arsuaga, section “Glaciation and Human Evolution in Europe”

(obsolete, now nonstandard) Synonym of foraminifer


hantkeninid

But la grande coupure occurred in two pulses about 350,000 years apart, just after the last hantkeninids found their eternal rest.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: The First 100 Million Years, Penguin, published 2019, page 82

(paleontology) A member of the extinct family Hantkeninidae of planktonic foraminifera.