A Grammatical Dictionary of Botanical Latin

Zooid: [zo- + oid, > Gk. zoon, s.n.II (first vowel = omega) 'a living being, animal' + eidos, resemblance + -eum]: a member of a colony of animals which are joined together, such as a polyp, a polypide; "an entity that resembles but is not wholly the same as a separate individual organism: as

a: an organized body (as a phagocyte or a sperm cell) having locomotion

b: "a more or less independent animal produced (as by fission, proliferation, or strobilation ) by other than direct sexual methods [with] equivocal individuality, used esp. of a single person of a compound organism (as a hydroid, coral or bryozoan colony)" WIII: e.g. the 'zoid' in certain solitary corals;

Two possible Latinizations would include:

1. zooidium,-ii (s.n.II), abl. sg. sooidio [> Gk. zoon, s.n.II (first vowel = omega) 'a living being, animal' + eidos, resemblance + -ium, Gk. diminutive]

2. zooideum,-i (s.n.II), abl. sg. zooideo [zo + oideum], declined on analogy with rhizoid: rhizoideum,-ei (s.n.II), abl. sg. rhizoideo > rhiza,-ae, s.f.I from the Greek, meaning root, indicating a structure, as in mosses, that only resembles a root, as a zooid only resembles an animal.