life cycle

See also: lifecycle

English

life cycle (plural life cycles)

(biology) The course of stages through which an organism passes from fertilized zygote until maturity, reproduction, and death.
- 2013 September-October, Kayri Havens, Sandra Henderson, “Citizen Science Takes Root”, in American Scientist:
  Plants’ life cycles are an attractive subject of study for citizen science because they are relatively easy to discern. In fact, the name for the field in which we work, phenology, literally means “the science of appearance.” The word was coined just a few years after Thoreau made his phenological observations, from the Greek phaino (to show or appear) and logos (to study).
(by extension) The useful life of a product or system; the developmental history of an individual or group in society.
- December 15 2022, Samanth Subramanian, “Dismantling Sellafield: the epic task of shutting down a nuclear site”, in The Guardian‎:
  Since it began operating in 1950, Sellafield has had different duties. First it manufactured plutonium for nuclear weapons. Then it generated electricity for the National Grid, until 2003. It also carried out years of fuel reprocessing: extracting uranium and plutonium from nuclear fuel rods after they’d ended their life cycles.

course of stages through which an organism passes

useful life of a product or system; developmental history of an individual or group