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mutation

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Mutation

English

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English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Late 14th century as Middle English mutacioun, from Latin mūtātiō, both directly and via Old French mutacion.[1]

Pronunciation

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Noun

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mutation (countable and uncountable, plural mutations)

  1. Any alteration or change.
  2. (genetics) Any heritable change of the base-pair sequence of genetic material.
    • 2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist[1], volume 101, number 3, archived from the original on 14 August 2013:
      Plant breeding is always a numbers game. [] The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation, […]. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better. These rarities may be new mutations, or they can be existing ones that are neutral—or are even selected against—in a wild population. A good example is mutations that disrupt seed dispersal, leaving the seeds on the heads long after they are ripe.
  3. A mutant.
  4. (linguistics) An alteration in a particular sound of a word, especially the initial consonant, which is triggered by the word's morphological or syntactic context and not by its phonological context.
  5. (law) The transfer of title of an asset in a register.
  6. (rare, collective noun) A group of thrushes.
    • 1984, Virginia Wildlife, volume 45, Virginia Commission of Game and Inland Fisheries:
      Birdwatchers would enjoy a host of sparrows, a herd of swans, a descent of woodpeckers, a herd of wrens, and mutation of thrushes.
    • 2010, Doug Bennet, Tim Tiner, The Complete Up North: A Guide to Ontario's Wilderness from Black Flies to the Northern Lights, page 57:
      Names for a group: A flute or mutation of thrushes.
    • 2013, Jason Sacher, A Compendium of Collective Nouns: From an Armory of Aardvarks to a Zeal of Zebras, page 196:
      A Mutation of Thrushes
      The authors of the books of venery were not predicting Darwin with this term, but taking a cue from a common fable of the time.

Derived terms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “mutation”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Anagrams

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French

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Etymology

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Inherited from Middle French mutation, from Old French mutacion, borrowed from Latin mutātiōnem.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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mutation f (plural mutations)

  1. substitution
  2. mutation
  3. transfer, move

Derived terms

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Descendants

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  • Turkish: mutasyon

Further reading

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Middle French

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Etymology

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From Old French mutacion, borrowed from Latin mutatio, mutationem.

Noun

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mutation f (plural mutations)

  1. change, alteration, mutation
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Descendants

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Swedish

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Noun

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mutation c

  1. (countable, uncountable, genetics) mutation
  2. (countable, uncountable, by extension) mutation (alteration or change, more generally)

Declension

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See also

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References

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