Polymorphism

In materials science polymorphism is the ability of a solid material to exist in more than one form or crystal structure. Diamond and graphite are examples of polymorphs of carbon. α-ferrite, austenite, and δ-ferrite are polymorphs of iron. When found in elemental solids the condition is also called Allotropy.

In biology multiple alleles of a gene within a population, usually expressing different phenotypes, are called polymorphism.

In object-orientated programming languages, polymorphism describes mathods of different objects that have the same name (and usually the same parameter list), so that calling a.add(1) invokes a different function than b.add(1).

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