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The Collaborative International Dictionary
Filaria

Filaria \Fi*la"ri*a\, n.; pl. filariae. [NL., fr. L. filum a thread.] (Zo["o]l.) a small, slender nematode worm of the family Onchocercidae ( Filariidae) of many species, parasitic when adult in various animals, including man. They may live within the blood, or in other bodily fluids, or within tissues or cavities of the body. Infection with such organisms may be transmitted by blood-sucking arthropods.

Filaria

Filaria \Fi*la"ri*a\, n. [NL., fr. L. filum a thread.] (Zo["o]l.) a former genus comprised of certain nematodes, now classed as belonging to several genera within the family Onchocercidae. See Onchocerca and Guinea worm.

Wiktionary
filaria

n. Any of the parasitic nematode worms of Filarioidea superfamily that live in the blood of vertebrates and is transmitted by insects: the cause of filariasis.

WordNet
filaria
  1. n. European weed naturalized in southwestern United States and Mexico having reddish decumbent stems with small fernlike leaves and small deep reddish-lavender flowers followed by slender fruits that stick straight up; often grown for forage [syn: redstem storksbill, alfilaria, alfileria, filaree, clocks, pin grass, pin clover, Erodium cicutarium]

  2. slender threadlike roundworms living in the blood and tissues of vertebrates; transmitted as larvae by biting insects

  3. [also: filariiae (pl)]

Usage examples of "filaria".

They could alight on a sleeping man without waking him and insinuate their poisoned needles deep into his flesh, sucking his blood, injecting itches, fever, the parasitic worms of filaria, and slow death.

There is a comparable filaria that infects man and clogs up the lymphatic ducts.

Although elephantiasis is met with in all climates, it is more common in the tropics, and its occurrence has been repeatedly demonstrated in these localities to be dependent on the presence in the lymphatics of the filaria sanguinis hominis.

February, 1896, Henry of Philadelphia showed microscopic slides containing blood which was infested with numbers of living and active filaria embryos.