bottleneck

views updated May 09 2018

bot·tle·neck / ˈbätlˌnek/ • n. 1. the neck or mouth of a bottle.2. a point of congestion or blockage, in particular: ∎  a narrow section of road or a junction that impedes traffic flow: narrow streets and a lack of parking space combine to make the town a bottleneck. ∎  a situation that causes delay in a process or system: lack of imports is making the bottlenecks in domestic output worse than usual.3. a device shaped like the neck of a bottle, worn on a guitarist's finger to produce special sound effects. ∎  (also bottleneck guitar) the style of guitar playing that uses such a device.

bottleneck

views updated May 08 2018

bottleneck A severe reduction in population size, often leading to a founder effect. Bottleneck events are commonly followed by rapid population expansion in which the rate of loss of new lineages is greatly reduced, giving rise to star phylogenies.

bottleneck

views updated May 29 2018

bottleneck A severe reduction in population size, often leading to a founder effect. Bottleneck events are commonly followed by rapid population expansion in which the rate of loss of new lineages is greatly reduced, giving rise to star phylogenies.