Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Not contaminated by or associated with any other living organisms. Usually used in reference to pure cultures of microorganisms that are completely free of the presence of other organisms.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective raised under sterile conditions; -- of experimental animals.
  • adjective pure or completely free of the presence of other organisms; -- used of cultures of microorganisms.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective biology Containing only a single species of microorganism. For example, an "axenic culture" means that a pure sample of the organism in question has been grown.
  • adjective biology Isolated from organisms of any other species

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective (of experimental animals) raised under sterile conditions
  • adjective (used of cultures of microorganisms) completely free from other organisms

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[a– + Greek xenikos, foreign (from xenos, stranger; see ghos-ti- in Indo-European roots).]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

a- +‎ xenic

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Examples

  • Researchers can generate bacteria-free axenic mice.

    No metazoan is an island - The Panda's Thumb 2010

  • Naturally, once China showed a willingness to abandon its axenic attitude towards foreign devils and all things foreign-devilish, the

    William of Germany Stanley Shaw

  • Naturally, once China showed a willingness to abandon its axenic attitude towards foreign devils and all things foreign-devilish, the European Powers turned their eyes and energies towards her, and a strenuous commercial and diplomatic race after prospective concessions for railways, mines, and undertakings of all kinds began.

    William of Germany Shaw, Stanley 1913

  • Epimastigote forms of T. cruzi were grown in liver-infusion tryptose axenic medium at 27°C.

    PLoS ONE Alerts: New Articles Mariana M. Hecht et al. 2010

  • On the day 14, trophozoites were eliminated from the co-culture while about 5x10 (4) cells/ml remained in the axenic T. pyriformis culture.

    BioMed Central - Latest articles 2010

  • Epimastigote forms of T. cruzi were grown in liver-infusion tryptose axenic medium at 27°C.

    PLoS ONE Alerts: New Articles Mariana M. Hecht et al. 2010

  • Analyzing this data set, we found that among the list of 443 genes reported by Sillo et al. [23] to be responsive to a switch from axenic growth of

    PLoS ONE Alerts: New Articles 2009

  • L. gibba bioassay procedures (like test vessel material, sterilisation and axenic culturing procedures) influence the sensitivity of the bioassay

    PLoS ONE Alerts: New Articles 2008

  • Actinomycin-D puromycin-HCl axenic cultures nematode, Neoaplectana glaseri

    xml's Blinklist.com 2008

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