Definition of "thermophilic" []

• Requiring high temperatures for normal development, as certain bacteria. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Lambowitz and Mohr's investigation of introns in T. elongatus may also, unexpectedly, prove an enormous boon to researchers who are trying to use other high-temperature ( "thermophilic") bacteria to improve the efficiency of biofuels."
• ""thermophilic," a word that means "likes heat" but one that Foley had never heard before, she asked for the language of origin."
• "If warming occurs within the Barents Sea over the next hundred years, thermophilic species (i.e., those capable of living within a wide temperature range) will become more frequent."