atavism

• Nom désignant la réapparition, chez un individu, d'un caractère ou d'un trait propre à un ancêtre éloigné ou à un stade évolutif antérieur, souvent perçu comme un retour à un état passé.

A noun referring to the reappearance of a characteristic or trait from an earlier evolutionary or ancestral stage, often considered a throwback.

1. Reappearance of ancestral traitC2formalscientific

   The reappearance of a characteristic or feature that was present in a distant ancestor but had been lost in more recent generations.

   atavisme

   • The presence of a tail in a human infant is a rare example of atavism.
   • Some biologists consider the reappearance of extra toes in horses as an atavism.
   • The study of atavism helps scientists understand genetic inheritance patterns.

   Synonymesreversionthrowback