ecologicaladj.
/ˌiːkəˈlɒdʒᵻkl/, /ˌɛkəˈlɒdʒᵻkl/, U.S. /ˌɛkəˈlɑdʒək(ə)l/, /ˌikəˈlɑdʒək(ə)l/ 1. Biology. Of, relating to, or involving the interrelationships between living organisms and their environment. Later also: environmental; of or relating to the natural environment.
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the world > life > biology > study > [adjective] > ecology
ecological1879
bionomic1890
bionomical1890
ecologic1894
synecological1906
autecological1926
socioecological1936
ecogeographic1951
radioecological1952
socioecologic1970
1879 tr. E. Haeckel Evol. Man I. vii. 165 Among the latter are the chorological and œcological functions.
1890 Cent. Dict. Œcological, of or pertaining to œcology.
1893 Bot. Gaz. 18 439 The present tendency to introduce physiological and ecological characters in the description of new forms is virtually a necessity.
1899 Nat. Sci. July 11 One of the most important oecological studies which has yet appeared in the United States.
1909 E. Warming et al. Oecol. Plants p. v I have given my views on oecological classification in a more comprehensive and detailed manner.
1926 Spectator 25 Sept. 492/1 Part of the distinctively modern progress in palaeontology has just been this ecological outlook.
1936 H. G. Wells Anat. Frustration ix. 86 I assume the world community..subject to general ecological laws.
1957 G. E. Hutchinson Treat. Limnol. I. p. x The second [volume] will deal with limnobiology and the ecological, typological, and stratigraphic problems of lake development.
1979 O. Davies in Omni Bk. of Space 135 The controlled Ecological Life Support System (CELSS) program is managing to support about 25 projects aimed at growing food.
1993 A. Toffler & H. Toffler War & Anti-war iii. xiv. 123 These acts are primitive compared with some of the imaginable (and imagined) possibilities of sophisticated ecological weaponry.
2006 Metro (Toronto) 7 Sept. (Film festival section) 7/1 Sharkwater will..take note of the plight of sharks and the potentially devastating ecological effects the species demise could have on other aquatic animals.
2. Concerned with environmental issues; environmentalist. Also: (of a thing or activity) environmentally friendly; causing minimal damage to the environment.
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1969 Stars & Stripes (European ed.) 23 May 11/4 In Udall's analysis, widely shared by conservationists, a ‘third wave’ was building—an ‘ecological’ movement that would treat resources, environment and man himself as a single, intricate ‘web of life’.
1972 Winnipeg (Manitoba) Free Press 4 Nov. 22/3 Britain's first ecological house—a home-cum-greenhouse designed to make its occupant as self-sufficient as possible.
1980 J. F. Pilat Ecol. Politics 73 The United Kingdom has no significant ecological parties; the Ecology party recently had only 600 members.
1991 Twenty Twenty Spring 22/1 In recent times Sting has become better known as an ecological campaigner than as the sensitive rocker of old.
2006 Observer (Nexis) 2 July 65 A genuine ecological product..will contain biodegradable ingredients.
Compounds
ecological footprint n. (a measure of) the impact of a person, community, or organization on the environment in terms of resource use, esp. expressed as the area of land in hectares required to sustain a prevailing pattern of production and consumption; cf. footprint n. 8.
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1992 Environment & Urbanization 4 121 The total area of land required to sustain an urban region (its ‘ecological footprint’) is typically at least an order of magnitude greater than that contained within municipal boundaries.
1996 Austin (Texas) Amer.-Statesman 25 Apr. b10 Humanity must learn to leave a smaller ecological footprint,..or the 21st century will be filled with unpleasant environmental surprises.
2006 New Scientist 17 June 37/2 Scientists calculate that a sustainable ecological footprint that shares all the world's resources equally among its inhabitants would be 1.8 hectares per person... The eco-footprint of a typical American is 9.7.
ecological niche n. = niche n. 4b; also in figurative context; cf. slightly earlier ecologic niche n. at ecologic adj. Compounds.
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1917 Amer. Naturalist 51 590 Migration, geographic isolation with adaptation to local ecological niches, and final re-invasion of earlier-occupied localities, will account for the origin and present distribution of geographic subspecies such as we have been considering.
1960 N. Polunin Introd. Plant Geogr. xiv. 431 The large lianes comprise..by far the more numerous synusiae (groups of plants of similar life-form, each filling much the same ecological niche and playing a similar role).
2004 B. Bunch & A. Hellemans Hist. Sci. & Technol. 516/3 The principle that two similar species cannot occupy similar ecological niches for long periods of time (known as Gause's principle).
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2008; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.1879