co-adaptation

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   mutual or coordinated adaptation between species, organs, traits, or genes

   The flower and its pollinator show co-adaptation through matching shapes and breeding cycles.

Formed from co-, 'together or mutually,' + adaptation. Darwin used coadaptation for the coordinated fit of organisms to one another and to their conditions. Later evolutionary biology often describes reciprocal changes between interacting species as coevolution.

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