Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of Merge Sort?

Merge Sort is a well-known sorting algorithm characterized by its divide-and-conquer approach. It sorts elements by recursively dividing the list into smaller sublists until each sublist contains a single element and then merging these sublists to produce a sorted list. This characteristic is fundamental to Merge Sort's operation and underscores the correctness of options related to its sorting methodology.

The merging process requires additional memory, as temporary arrays are created to hold the elements being merged. This aligns with the characteristic of Merge Sort needing space for these temporary arrays during its processing, which indicates that understanding the algorithm's space requirements is crucial.

Merge Sort is particularly efficient for large, unsorted lists due to its predictable time complexity of O(n log n), regardless of the input data. This makes it suitable for handling large volumes of data where consistent performance is essential.

However, it is important to note that Merge Sort does not always perform better than Quick Sort in all scenarios. Quick Sort is generally faster on average because it has a lower constant factor in its time complexity. Although Quick Sort can degrade to O(n²) in its worst-case scenario, this condition is less common compared to Merge Sort's O(n log n) performance. Therefore, stating that Merge Sort performs better than Quick Sort in