Exaptation or co-option is a shift in the function of a trait during evolution. For example, a trait can evolve because it served one particular function...

Architectural exaptation is a concept in architecture and urban design that involves repurposing buildings, structures, or architectural elements for new...

which has occurred as an exaptation of the epithelial folding that is undergone during ontogeny. This scalloped exaptation has then provided stress relief...

developing the turnover-pulse hypothesis, as well as coining the word exaptation with colleague Stephen Jay Gould. Her specific interest is in the Family...

further back still were part of the gill arches of early fish. The word exaptation was coined to cover these common evolutionary shifts in function. The...

Heidmann, T. (2015). "Retroviral envelope gene captures and syncytin exaptation for placentation in marsupials". Proceedings of the National Academy of...

term "exaptation" for characteristics that enhance fitness in their present role but were not built for that role by natural selection. Exaptations may...

Specifically, calcium-based minerals were stored in cartilage and bone was an exaptation development from this calcified cartilage. However, other possibilities...

vestigiality with that of exaptation. Both may occur together in the same example, depending on the relevant point of view. In exaptation, a structure originally...

However, many traits that appear to be simple adaptations are in fact exaptations: structures originally adapted for one function, but which coincidentally...