A centimorgan (cM) is a unit of measurement for the frequency of DNA recombination.

One centimorgan is equal to a 1% chance that a marker at one genetic locus will be separated from a marker at a second locus due to crossing over in a single generation. In human beings, 1 centimorgan is equivalent, on average, to 1 million base pairs.

The information in this writeup was taken from the science dictionary at http://biotech.icmb.utexas.edu/; I oversaw the development of the dictionary (the website was mothballed in 1998) and I believe I wrote the entry this is based on.