Flagellum
cellular appendages functioning as locomotive or sensory organelles
A flagellum (; pl.: flagella) (Latin for 'whip' or 'scourge') is a hair-like appendage that protrudes from certain plant and animal sperm cells, from fungal spores (zoospores), and from a wide range of microorganisms to provide motility. Many protists with flagella are known as flagellates.
Across the three domains of Bacteria, Archaea, and Eukaryota, the flagellum has a different structure, protein composition, and mechanism of propulsion but shares the same function of providing motility. The Latin word flagellum means "whip" to describe its lash-like swimming motion.
The flagella of bacteria and archaea, prokaryotes, are rotor-like structures that propel the organism via roatation. While very similar to bacterial flagella, the flagellum in archaea is called the archaellum to note its difference from the bacterial flagellum.
Eukaryotic flagella differ from prokaryotic flagella as they are large membrane protrusions supported by the cytoskeleton, which wave back and forth rather than rotate. Eukaryotic cilia are very similar to flagella but are much shorter. Surface-attached cilia and flagella are used to swim or move fluid from one region to another.
A cell may have zero, one, or many flagella depending on the species and cell type.
“Flagellum” enters the record as cellular appendages functioning as locomotive or sensory organelles. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Flagellum, cellular and appendages can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q189998. The Library of Congress control number is sh85048954. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Flagellum” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.