microenvironment

A very small area that has different characteristics than its surroundings; the milieu (set of conditions) within this area.

Noun

  1. A very small area that has different characteristics than its surroundings; the milieu (set of conditions) within this area.
    • What was seen from the top down, as a large environment with many difficult trade-offs, is instead seen from the bottom up--as 10 million microenvironments, each to be regulated in its own right. It is this inversion of...
    1. (ecology) Synonym of microhabitat.

      Synonyms: microhabitat

    2. (biology) The very small environment in the immediate vicinity of an organism.

      • As with the Lejeuneaceae, this pattern of massive speciation appears to be correlated with the Cretaceous explosion of the angiosperms and the simultaneous creation of a host of new microenvironments, differing in...

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *mey-der.? Ancient Greek μικρός (mikrós)der. English micro- Middle French environnementbor. English environment English microenvironment From micro- + environment.

Forms

microenvironments

Related

microecology