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Adaptation affects all aspects of the life of an organism. [24] The following definitions are given by the evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky: 1. Adaptation is the evolutionary process whereby an organism becomes better able to live in its habitat or habitats. [25] [26] [27] 2.
Morphological adaptations observed at the cellular level include atrophy, hypertrophy, hyperplasia, and metaplasia. [1] In the medical context, outside of specialized branches of biomedicine, morphological adaptations are not always referenced to the fundamental cellular level, but are observed and assessed at the level of tissues and organs.
A psychological adaptation seen universally in humans is to easily learn a fear of snakes. [1] A psychological adaptation is a functional, cognitive or behavioral trait that benefits an organism in its environment. Psychological adaptations fall under the scope of evolved psychological mechanisms (EPMs), [2] however, EPMs refer to a less ...
Charles Darwin. The idea that the function of a trait might shift during its evolutionary history originated with Charles Darwin (Darwin 1859).For many years the phenomenon was labeled "preadaptation", but since this term suggests teleology in biology, appearing to conflict with natural selection, it has been replaced by the term "exaptation".
Given this, it is best to understand that presently functional traits might not all have been produced by natural selection. [3] The term "function" is preferable to "adaptation", because adaptation is often construed as implying that it was selected for due to past function. This corresponds to Aristotle's final cause. [5]
Depending on geographical and environmental pressures, high-altitude adaptation involves different genetic patterns, some of which have evolved not long ago. For example, Tibetan adaptations became prevalent in the past 3,000 years, an example of rapid recent human evolution. At the turn of the 21st century, it was reported that the genetic ...
A functional characteristic is known in evolutionary biology as an adaptation, and the research strategy for investigating whether a character is adaptive is known as adaptationism. Although assuming that a character is functional may be helpful in research, some characteristics of organisms are non-functional, formed as accidental spandrels ...
Functional diversity is widely considered to be "the value and the range of those species and organismal traits that influence ecosystem functioning" [3] In this sense, the use of the term "function" may apply to individuals, populations, communities, trophic levels, or evolutionary process (i.e. considering the function of adaptations). [3 ...