Define adaptation

Imagine that you just walked into your favorite Italian restaurant. The delicious smell of garlic and tomatoes is almost overwhelming when you first walk through the door. You sit down to wait for a table, and after a few minutes, the scents dissipate until you barely notice them. This is an example of sensory adaptation. Sensory adaptation serves an important function by helping people tune out distractions and focus on the most relevant or important stimuli around them. Imagine what it would be like if you didn't experience sensory adaptation. You might find yourself overwhelmed by the pungent smell of onions coming from the kitchen or the blare of the television in the living room. • Scent: Smokers are not bothered by the smell of • Sight: When you go into a dark room or outside at night, your eyes eventually adjust to the darkness because your pupils enlarge to let in more light. Likewise, when you are in bright light, your eyes adjust to the narrowing of your pupils. This is another form of sensory adaptation. • Touch: When you jump into a cold swimming pool or first get into a hot tub, the water may feel unpleasantly cold or much too hot, but eventually, your body adjusts to the temperature, and it feels only mildly cool or perfectly pleasant and even, eventually, too cold or too warm. • Taste: With the first bite of a very flavorful dish, you'll notice the strong saltiness, sourness, or sweetness of the food. But after a few mouthfuls, your taste buds will adapt, an...

"Nothing in this world is as reliable as change" is a common adapt, for example, in the 15th century from the Middle French adapter, which was itself an adaptation of Latin adaptāre. That source traces back to Latin aptus, meaning "fit" or "apt." Other adaptations of aptus in English include aptitude, inept, and of course apt itself, as well as unapt and inapt. When children go to a different school, it usually takes them a while to adapt. She has adapted herself to college life quite easily. The camera has been adapted for underwater use. The clock was adapted to run on batteries. The movie was adapted from the book of the same title. adapting the movie for television See More Recent Examples on the Web Many plant and animal species have, however, adapted to survive and even thrive in wildfire conditions. — Jamie Ducharme, Time, 7 June 2023 Given the impact of climate change, many experts say insurance companies and governments should be working together to develop tools, incentives and partnerships to help Americans adapt, instead of just charging them more money. — Brianna Sacks, Anchorage Daily News, 7 June 2023 And Knox said as the state continues to see warmer winters, farmers will have to adapt. — Meris Lutz, al, 6 June 2023 At first, this plan ( adapted from the 2011 event comic Flashpoint by Geoff Johns and Andy Kubert) seems to work great! — Christian Holub, EW.com, 6 June 2023 Fortune spoke with investors, analysts, and entrepreneurs to discover how the new indu...

Recent Examples on the Web Because of the relatively small number of adaptive athletes, teams often draw from wider geographic areas. — Matty Wasserman, BostonGlobe.com, 30 May 2023 The challenge, Doursat says, is to find ways of ensuring reliable outcomes that will not be thwarted by small perturbations and that are adaptive—if circumstances change, the system needs to be able to find a solution that does the job. — Philip Ball, Scientific American, 18 Apr. 2023 The moonlight adaptive lighting design project is part of a growing effort to balance the need for functional lighting in the town and to protect the darkness. — Smithsonian Magazine, 16 Mar. 2023 Most adaptive technology for sensory challenges is low or medium-tech. — Lisa Jo Rudy, Verywell Health, 7 Mar. 2023 Really just reminding myself that this is my first season as an adaptive athlete. — Tanvi Kumar, Outside Online, 6 Mar. 2023 There are also packages including the $2995 Track Pack with larger wheels and tires, adaptive dampers, and upgraded interior trim; the $1995 Blacktop package with dark trim; and the $2245 Tech Pack with driver-assistance features. — Joey Capparella, Car and Driver, 17 Feb. 2023 The Dragonfly series is already well crafted, and AMD's adaptive PMF should introduce exciting competition between it and Apple's MacBook. — Patrick Moorhead, Forbes, 11 Jan. 2023 Eevee, Kelley explained, was a great example of adaptive evolution, as Eevee can transform itself based on environmental factors. — ...

[uncountable, countable] the action or process of changing something, or of being changed, to suit a new purpose or situation • the adaptation of buildings for military purposes • adaptation to something The process of adaptation to a new school is difficult for some children. • making adaptations to your home

Princeton's WordNet Rate this definition: 2.4 / 5 votes • adaptation, version noun a written work (as a novel) that has been recast in a new form "the play is an adaptation of a short novel" • adaptation, adaption, adjustment noun the process of adapting to something (such as environmental conditions) • adaptation noun (physiology) the responsive adjustment of a sense organ (as the eye) to varying conditions (as of light) Wiktionary Rate this definition: 3.5 / 10 votes • adaptation noun The quality of being adapted; adaption; adjustment. • adaptation noun 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. • adaptation noun Something which has been adapted; variation. Samuel Johnson's Dictionary Rate this definition: 0.0 / 0 votes • Adaptation noun The act of fitting one thing to another; the fitness of one thing to another. Etymology: from adapt. Some species there be of middle natures, that is, of bird and beast, as batts; yet are their parts so set together, that we cannot define the beginning or end of either, there being a commixtion of both, rather than adaptation or cement of the one unto the other. Thomas Browne, Vulgar Errours, b. iii. c. ii. Their adhesion may be in part ascribed, either to some elastical motion in the pressed glass, or to the exquisite adaptation of the almost numbe...