ADAPTATION

Adaptation

An adaptation, also called an adaptive trait, in biology is a trait with a current functional role in the life history of an organism that is maintained and evolved by means of natural selection. Adaptation refers to both the current state of being adapted and to the dynamic evolutionary process that leads to the adaptation. Adaptations contribute to the fitness and survival of individuals. Organisms face a succession of environmental challenges as they grow and develop and are equipped with an adaptive plasticity as the phenotype of traits develop in response to the imposed conditions. The developmental norm of reaction for any ...

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adaptation

Noun

  1. The quality of being adapted; adaption; adjustment.
  2. Adjustment to extant conditions: as, adjustment of a sense organ to the intensity or quality of stimulation; modification of some thing or its parts that makes it more fit for existence under the conditions of its current environment.
  3. Something which has been adapted; variation.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: adaptation
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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