evolve

Borrowed from Latin ēvolvere, present active infinitive of ēvolvō (“unroll, unfold”), from ē (“out of”) (short form of ex) + volvō (“roll”).

evolve (third-person singular simple present evolves, present participle evolving, simple past and past participle evolved)

1. To move in regular procession through a system.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Sir M. Hale

     The animal soul sooner evolves itself to its full orb and extent than the human soul.

   • (Can we date this quote?) William Whewell

     The principles which art involves, science alone evolves.

   • (Can we date this quote?) John Shairp

     Not by any power evolved from man's own resources, but by a power which descended from above.

2. (intransitive) To change; transform.
3. To come into being; develop.
   • 1939, P. G. Wodehouse, Uncle Fred in the Springtime

     You will remove the pig, place it in the car, and drive it to my house in Wiltshire. That is the plan I have evolved.

4. (biology) Of a population, to change genetic composition over successive generations through the process of evolution.
   • 1859, Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species, p. 502:

     There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

   • 2013 September-October, Katie L. Burke, “In the News”, in American Scientist:

     Oxygen levels on Earth skyrocketed 2.4 billion years ago, when cyanobacteria evolved photosynthesis: the ability to convert water and carbon dioxide into carbohydrates and waste oxygen using solar energy.

5. (chemistry) To give off (gas, such as oxygen or carbon dioxide during a reaction).

   to evolve odours

6. (transitive) To cause something to change or transform.

• evolute
• evolution
• evolutional
• evolutionary
• evolutionally
• evolutionarily
• evolutionism
• evolutionist
• evolutionistic
• evolutionistically
• evolutive
• evolutiveness
• evolutivity
• evolvable
• evolvability
• evolvement
• evolver

• Rhymes: -ɔlve

evolve

1. third-person singular present indicative of evolvere

ēvolve

1. second-person singular present active imperative of ēvolvō

evolve

1. third-person singular present indicative of evolver
2. second-person singular imperative of evolver