| Trimorphism | n. [ See Trimorphic. ] 1. (Crystallog.) The property of crystallizing in three forms fundamentally distinct, as is the case with titanium dioxide, which crystallizes in the forms of rutile, octahedrite, and brookite. See Pleomorphism. [ 1913 Webster ] 2. (Biol.) The coexistence among individuals of the same species of three distinct forms, not connected, as a rule, by intermediate gradations; the condition among individuals of the same species of having three different shapes or proportions of corresponding parts; -- contrasted with polymorphism, and dimorphism. [ 1913 Webster ]
Heterogonous trimporphism (Bot.), that condition in which flowers of plants of the same species have three different lengths of stamens, short, medium, and long, the blossoms of one individual plant having short and medium stamens and a long style, those of another having short and long stamens and a style of medium length, and those of a third having medium and long stamens and a short style, the style of each blossom thus being of a length not represented by its stamens. [ 1913 Webster ]
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| Dimorphism | n. [ Cf. F. dimorphisme. ] 1. (Biol.) Difference of form between members of the same species, as when a plant has two kinds of flowers, both hermaphrodite (as in the partridge berry), or when there are two forms of one or both sexes of the same species of butterfly. [ 1913 Webster ] Dimorphism is the condition of the appearance of the same species under two dissimilar forms. Darwin. [ 1913 Webster ] 2. (Crystallog.) Crystallization in two independent forms of the same chemical compound, as of calcium carbonate as calcite and aragonite. [ 1913 Webster ] |
