modification

n. a small change made to something to improve it or make it more suitable.

n. the act of making a minor alteration or adjustment to something while keeping its essential character intact.

“The engineers made a slight modification to the engine to help it use less fuel.”

“The architect suggested a minor modification to the original floor plan to allow for more natural light in the central hallway.”

n. the way a word's meaning is changed or limited by another word.

n. the structural relationship where one word or phrase limits or qualifies the meaning of another.

“In the phrase 'red apple', the word 'red' is a modification of 'apple'.”

“The student struggled with noun modification, often placing the adjective after the noun instead of before it.”

Academic · Technical

n. a change in a living thing caused by its environment that is not passed on to its babies.

n. a non-heritable change in an organism's phenotype resulting from environmental influence.

“The plant's smaller leaves were a modification caused by the dry soil, not its genes.”

“Biologists distinguish between genetic mutations and environmental modifications that do not alter the underlying DNA sequence of the species.”

Technical