Homeology

(a term proposed by the German zoologist L. Plate in 1922), a morphological or physiological similarity of organs or traits acquired under the influence of similar life conditions and manifested by animals of distant systematic groups (for example, the sternum pecten of birds and moles, the flippers of the ichthyosaur, plesiosaur, and whale). Superficially such organs are similar to true homologous organs, although in reality they are analogous organs.