Life cycle, life-cycle, or lifecycle may refer to:

Science and academia

Biological life cycle In biology, a biological life cycle (or just life cycle when the biological context is clear) is a series of stages of the life of an organism, that begins as a zygote, often in an egg, and concludes as an adult that reproduces, producing an offsp ...

, the sequence of life stages that an organism undergoes from conception to reproduction *

Life-cycle hypothesis In economics, the life-cycle hypothesis (LCH) is a model that strives to explain the consumption patterns of individuals. Theory and evidence Elderly dissaving is also influenced by the present factors that materially prevent them from the possibi ...

, in economics *

Erikson's stages of psychosocial development Erikson's stages of psychosocial development, as articulated in the second half of the 20th century by Erik Erikson in collaboration with Joan Erikson, is a comprehensive psychoanalytic theory that identifies a series of eight stages that a h ...

, in psychoanalysis * Life-cycle of phonological processes, in linguistics

Business

Enterprise life cycle Enterprise life cycle (ELC) in enterprise architecture is the dynamic, iterative process of changing the enterprise over time by incorporating new business processes, new technology, and new capabilities, as well as maintenance, disposition and d ...

, the process of changing a business enterprise *

Project life cycle Project management is the process of supervising the work of a team to achieve all project goals within the given constraints. This information is usually described in project documentation, created at the beginning of the development process ...

Product lifecycle In Industry (economics), industry, product lifecycle management (PLM) is the process of managing the entire lifecycle of a product from its inception through the Product engineering, engineering, Product design, design, and Manufacturing, ma ...

, the stages in the lifespan of a commercial or consumer product *

New product development New product development (NPD) or product development in business and engineering covers the complete process of launching a new product to the market. Product development also includes the renewal of an existing product and introducing a product ...

, the process of bringing a new product to market *

Life-cycle assessment Life cycle assessment (LCA), also known as life cycle analysis, is a methodology for assessing the impacts associated with all the stages of the life cycle of a commercial product, process, or service. For instance, in the case of a manufact ...

, the analysis of the environmental impacts associated with a product *

Technology life cycle The technology life cycle (TLC) describes the commercial gain of a product through the expense of research and development phase, and the financial return during its "vital life". Some technologies, such as steel, paper or cement manufacturing, ...

, the commercial gain of a product

Software

Software development life cycle In software engineering, a software development process or software development life cycle (SDLC) is a process of planning and managing software development. It typically involves dividing software development work into smaller, parallel, or s ...

Software release life cycle The software release life cycle is the process of developing, testing, and distributing a software product (e.g., an operating system). It typically consists of several stages, such as pre-alpha, alpha, beta, and release candidate, before the fi ...

Object lifetime Object may refer to: General meanings * Object (philosophy), a thing, being, or concept ** Object (abstract), an object which does not exist at any particular time or place ** Physical object, an identifiable collection of matter * Goal, an ...

of an object in object-oriented programming *

Program lifecycle phase {{about, a technical topic, project management, software development process Program lifecycle phases are the stages a computer program undergoes, from initial creation to deployment and execution. The phases are edit time, compile time, link ti ...

s are the stages a computer program undergoe, from initial creation to deployments.

Systems engineering

Systems development life cycle In systems engineering, information systems and software engineering, the systems development life cycle (SDLC), also referred to as the application development life cycle, is a process for planning, creating, testing, and deploying an informati ...

, a process for planning, creating, testing, and deploying, maintaining, and ultimate disposal of system in all phases of existence

Arts and entertainment

* ''Life Cycles'' (The Word Alive album), 2012 * ''Life Cycle'' (Dave Holland album), 1983 * ''Life Cycle'' (Sieges Even album), 1988 * ''Life Cycle'' (Whit Dickey album), 2001 * ''Life Cycle'' (Sakerock album), 2005 * ''Lifecycle'' (album), a 2008 album by Yellowjackets

Other uses

Āśrama (stage) ''Āśrama'' () is a system of stages of life discussed in Hindu texts of the ancient and medieval eras.Patrick Olivelle (1993), The Āśram System: The History and Hermeneutics of a Religious Institution, Oxford University Press, , pages 1� ...

, life stages in Hinduism *

Jewish life cycle The Jewish life cycle is marked by a series of religious and cultural rituals that celebrate significant milestones from birth to death. Each event has deep religious meaning, community involvement, and traditional practices that have been passed do ...

, a series of traditions associated with major life events in Judaism * Life cycle ritual, a ritual to mark certain events in an individual's lifetime *

Records life-cycle Records life-cycle in records management refers to the following stages of a records "life span": from its creation to its preservation (in an archives) or disposal. While various models of the records life-cycle exist, they all feature creation o ...