Basic Guidelines For English Spellings
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1Of or relating to the independent origin of a species in a number of different places.
2Designating a protein that is an integral part of a biological membrane, which it traverses two or more times (so that different segments of the same protein are exposed adjacent to each other on the extracellular and cytoplasmic faces of the membrane).
Early 20th century; earliest use found in The Botanical Gazette. From poly- + ancient Greek τόπος place + -ic.