Dictionary:

dimorphism

  (dī-môr'fĭz'əm)

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1. Biology. The existence among animals of the same species of two distinct forms that differ in one or more characteristics, such as coloration, size, or shape.
2. Botany. The occurrence of two distinct forms of the same parts in one plant, as in the juvenile and adult leaves of ivy.
3. Chemistry & Physics. Dimorphic crystallization.

The quality of existing in two distinct forms.

• sexual d. — 1. physical or behavioral differences associated with sex; males and females of the same species are different in appearance.
— 2. having some properties of both sexes, as in the early embryo and in some hermaphrodites.

Types of dimorphism (having two body types) include:

• Sexual dimorphism, differences in the body appearance of a species based on sex

• Nuclear dimorphism, when a cell's nuclear apparatus is composed of two structurally and functionally differentiated types of nuclei

• Phenotypic switching, switching between two cell-types. For example the fungus Candida albicans infects host tissue by switching from its usual unicellular yeast-like form into an invasive, multicellular filamentous form

• Frond dimorphism, differing forms of fern fronds between the sterile and fertile fronds

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