Leeuwenhoek

American  

[ley-vuhn-hook, ley-y-wuhn-hook] / ˈleɪ vənˌhʊk, ˈleɪ ü wənˌhuk /

Or Leuwenhoek

noun

1. Anton van 1632–1723, Dutch naturalist and microscopist.

---

Leeuwenhoek British  

/ ˈleːwənhuːk, ˈleɪvənˌhuːk /

noun

1. Anton van (ˈɑntɔn vɑn). 1632–1723, Dutch microscopist, whose microscopes enabled him to give the first accurate description of blood corpuscles, spermatozoa, and microbes

---

Leeuwenhoek Scientific  

/ lā′vən-hk′ /

1. Dutch naturalist and pioneer of microscopic research. He was the first to describe protozoa, bacteria, and spermatozoa. He also made observations of yeasts, red blood cells, and blood capillaries, and traced the life histories of various animals, including the flea, ant, and weevil.

---

Example Sentences

Ever since Antonie van Leeuwenhoek discovered the world of bacteria through a microscope in the late seventeenth century, humans have tried to look deeper into the world of the infinitesimally small.

From Science Daily • Oct. 18, 2023

And when sperm finally were formally discovered, by Antonie Philips van Leeuwenhoek, the father of microbiology, he was so uncomfortable he wished he could unsee what he'd just observed.

From Salon • Jan. 2, 2023

While pursuing his vocation, Leeuwenhoek became frustrated with the existing lenses and how they were not powerful enough to see threads in detail.

From Salon • Jan. 2, 2023

Around the same time Anton van Leeuwenhoek used a microscope to look at pond water.

From Textbooks • Jan. 1, 2018

Yet long before Leeuwenhoek such creatures had existed in the imagination of those who had grasped the full implications of the Scaling Revolution.

From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton