phoresysmall

Phoresysmall is a proposed ecological term for the hitchhiking transport of micro-scale particles and microbes by larger organisms to achieve dispersal. It lies within phoresis but focuses on tiny objects such as spores, pollen grains, bacteria, microplastics, and other particulate matter moved by host movement.

Key features include passive transport, weak host interactions, and reliance on surface adhesion or transient mucus layers. Phoresysmall events can occur across terrestrial, freshwater, and marine systems, enabling micro-objects to cross habitat boundaries with the host's travel.

Examples may include spores or dust clinging to insects, bacteria carried on arthropods, or microplastics attached to planktonic organisms that migrate between microhabitats. Highly mobile hosts can thus distribute particles far beyond their own geographic range.

Research methods combine microscopy, fluorescent tagging, and molecular tracing to separate actively transported particles from those dispersed by currents. Phoresysmall intersects aerosol science, microbial biogeography, and pollution ecology and has implications for disease vectors, invasive species, and microplastic distribution.

Phoresysmall is not yet standardized in formal taxonomy and is often used descriptively in theoretical or interdisciplinary contexts to discuss micro-scale dispersal via hitchhiking mechanisms.