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Author: James H. Brown Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA ISBN: 0195131428 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Scaling relationships have been a persistent theme in biology at least since the time of Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo. While there have been many excellent empirical and theoretical investigations, there has been little attempt to synthesize this diverse but interrelated area of biology. In an effort to fill this void, Scaling in Biology, the first general treatment of scaling in biology in over 15 years, covers a broad spectrum of the most relevant topics in a series of chapters written by experts in the field. Some of those topics discussed include allometry and fractal structure, branching of vascular systems of mammals and plants, biomechanical and life history of plants, invertebrates and vertebrates, and species-area patterns of biological diversity.
Author: James H. Brown Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA ISBN: 0195131428 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Scaling relationships have been a persistent theme in biology at least since the time of Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo. While there have been many excellent empirical and theoretical investigations, there has been little attempt to synthesize this diverse but interrelated area of biology. In an effort to fill this void, Scaling in Biology, the first general treatment of scaling in biology in over 15 years, covers a broad spectrum of the most relevant topics in a series of chapters written by experts in the field. Some of those topics discussed include allometry and fractal structure, branching of vascular systems of mammals and plants, biomechanical and life history of plants, invertebrates and vertebrates, and species-area patterns of biological diversity.
Author: William J. Jungers Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media ISBN: 1489936475 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 492
Book Description
In very general terms, "scaling" can be defined as the structural and func tional consequences of differences in size (or scale) among organisms of more or less similar design. Interest in certain aspects of body size and scaling in primate biology (e. g. , relative brain size) dates to the turn of the century, and scientific debate and dialogue on numerous aspects of this general subject have continued to be a primary concern of primatologists, physical an thropologists, and other vertebrate biologists up to the present. Indeed, the intensity and scope of such research on primates have grown enormously in the past decade or so. Information continues to accumulate rapidly from many different sources, and the task of synthesizing the available data and theories on any given topic is becoming increasingly formidable. In addition to the formal exchange of new ideas and information among scientific experts in specific areas of scaling research, two of the major goals of this volume are an assessment of our progress toward understanding various size-related phe nomena in primates and the identification of future prospects for continuing advances in this realm. Although the subject matter and specific details of the issues considered in the 20 chapters that follow are very diversified, all topics share the same fundamental and unifying biological theme: body size variation in primates and its implications for behavior and ecology, anatomy and physiology, and evolution.
Author: Geoffrey West Publisher: Penguin ISBN: 014311090X Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 498
Book Description
"This is science writing as wonder and as inspiration." —The Wall Street Journal Wall Street Journal From one of the most influential scientists of our time, a dazzling exploration of the hidden laws that govern the life cycle of everything from plants and animals to the cities we live in. Visionary physicist Geoffrey West is a pioneer in the field of complexity science, the science of emergent systems and networks. The term “complexity” can be misleading, however, because what makes West’s discoveries so beautiful is that he has found an underlying simplicity that unites the seemingly complex and diverse phenomena of living systems, including our bodies, our cities and our businesses. Fascinated by aging and mortality, West applied the rigor of a physicist to the biological question of why we live as long as we do and no longer. The result was astonishing, and changed science: West found that despite the riotous diversity in mammals, they are all, to a large degree, scaled versions of each other. If you know the size of a mammal, you can use scaling laws to learn everything from how much food it eats per day, what its heart-rate is, how long it will take to mature, its lifespan, and so on. Furthermore, the efficiency of the mammal’s circulatory systems scales up precisely based on weight: if you compare a mouse, a human and an elephant on a logarithmic graph, you find with every doubling of average weight, a species gets 25% more efficient—and lives 25% longer. Fundamentally, he has proven, the issue has to do with the fractal geometry of the networks that supply energy and remove waste from the organism’s body. West’s work has been game-changing for biologists, but then he made the even bolder move of exploring his work’s applicability. Cities, too, are constellations of networks and laws of scalability relate with eerie precision to them. Recently, West has applied his revolutionary work to the business world. This investigation has led to powerful insights into why some companies thrive while others fail. The implications of these discoveries are far-reaching, and are just beginning to be explored. Scale is a thrilling scientific adventure story about the elemental natural laws that bind us together in simple but profound ways. Through the brilliant mind of Geoffrey West, we can envision how cities, companies and biological life alike are dancing to the same simple, powerful tune.
Author: Thomas T. Samaras Publisher: Nova Publishers ISBN: 9781600214080 Category : Biometry Languages : en Pages : 398
Book Description
Several books have been published on scaling in biology and its ramifications in the animal kingdom. However, none has specifically examined the multifaceted effects of how changes in human height create disproportionately larger changes in weight, surface area, strength and other physiological parameters. Yet, the impact of these non-linear effects on individual humans as well as our world's environment is enormous. Since increasing human body size has widespread ramifications, this book presents findings on the human species and its ecological niche. its community and how the species interacts with its environment. Thus, a few chapters provide an ecological overview of how increasing human body size relates to human evolution, fitness, health, survival and the environment. This book provides a unique purview of the laws of scaling on human performance, health, longevity and the environment. Numerous examples from various research disciplines are used to illustrate the impact of increasing body size on many aspects of human enterprises, including work output, athletics and intellectual performance.
Author: Tamás Vicsek Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA ISBN: 9780198507895 Category : Computers Languages : en Pages : 246
Book Description
During the last decade the well-established tools of statistical physics have been successfully applied to an increasing number of biological phenomena. It is a fruitful approach to systems characterised by fluctuations and/or a large number of very similar units, and such systems are commonin biology, whether it be the individuals in the codons of a genetic code or the behavioural responses of macromolecules to thermal fluctuations. This book is thus able to cover a wide range of phenomena, including fractal pattern formation, group motion in organisms from bacteria to humans, or themechanisms by which fluctuations are rectified in the cell's molecular machinery. This book provides a summary of the majority of recent approaches and concepts born in the study of biological phenomena involving collective behaviour and random perturbation, as well as presenting some of the mostimportant new results to specialist researchers. It is, particularly, a key text for all students of scaling and fluctuations in biology.
Author: Knut Schmidt-Nielsen Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 9780521319874 Category : Medical Languages : en Pages : 260
Book Description
This book is about the importance of animal size. We tend to think of animal function in chemical terms and talk of water, salts, proteins, enzymes, oxygen, energy, and so on. We should not forget, however, that physical laws are equally important, for they determine rates of diffusion and heat transfer, transfer of force and momentum, the strength of structures, the dynamics of locomotion, and other aspects of the functioning of animal bodies. Physical laws provide possibilities and opportunities for an organism, yet they also impose constraints, setting limits to what is physically possible. This book aims to give an understanding of these rules because of their profound implications when we deal with animals of widely different size and scale. The reader will find that the book raises many questions. Remarkable and puzzling information makes it read a little like a detective story, but the last chapter, instead of giving the final solution, neither answers all questions nor provides one great unifying principle.
Author: Karl J. Niklas Publisher: University of Chicago Press ISBN: 9780226580807 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 424
Book Description
Allometry, the study of the growth rate of an organism's parts in relation to the whole, has produced exciting results in research on animals. Now distinguished plant biologist Karl J. Niklas has written the first book to apply allometry to studies of the evolution, morphology, physiology, and reproduction of plants. Niklas covers a broad spectrum of plant life, from unicellular algae to towering trees, including fossil as well as extant taxa. He examines the relation between organic size and variations in plant form, metabolism, reproduction, and evolution, and draws on the zoological literature to develop allometric techniques for the peculiar problems of plant height, the relation between body mass and body length, and size-correlated variations in rates of growth. For readers unfamiliar with the basics of allometry, an appendix explains basic statistical methods. For botanists interested in an original, quantitative approach to plant evolution and function, and for zoologists who want to learn more about the value of allometric techniques for studying evolution, Plant Allometry makes a major contribution to the study of plant life.
Author: Publisher: Academic Press ISBN: 0323139574 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 388
Book Description
Traditional plant physiological ecology is organism centered and provides a useful framework for understanding the interactions between plants and their environment and for identifying characteristics likely to result in plant success in a particular habitat. This book focuses on extending concepts from plant physiological ecology as a basis for understanding carbon, energy, and biogeochemical cycles at ecosystem, regional, and global levels. This will be a valuable resource for researchers and graduate students in ecology, plant ecophysiology, ecosystem research, biometerology, earth system science, and remote sensing. Key Features * The integration of metabolic activities across spatial scales, from leaf to ecosystem * Global constraints and regional processes * Functional units in ecological scaling * Models and technologies for scaling
Author: Trachette Jackson Publisher: Springer ISBN: 1493927825 Category : Mathematics Languages : en Pages : 233
Book Description
This volume highlights problems from a range of biological and medical applications that can be interpreted as questions about system behavior or control. Topics include drug resistance in cancer and malaria, biological fluid dynamics, auto-regulation in the kidney, anti-coagulation therapy, evolutionary diversification and photo-transduction. Mathematical techniques used to describe and investigate these biological and medical problems include ordinary, partial and stochastic differentiation equations, hybrid discrete-continuous approaches, as well as 2 and 3D numerical simulation.
Author: David Wake Publisher: ISBN: 9781621820727 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Size is a primary feature of living things. From egg to adult, the various organs, tissues, cells, and subcellular structures that make up an organism grow to appropriate sizes so that they effectively fit and function together. The misregulation of this growth can lead to diseases such as cancer. Written and edited by experts in the field, this collection from Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Biology examines our current understanding of the intrinsic and extrinsic mechanisms that precisely regulate the sizes of biological structures so that they can function efficiently in their cellular, organismal, or ecological context. Contributors discuss the various genetic, hormonal, and environmental inputs that trigger cells to grow, divide, or die, the various signaling pathways involved, and how these determine the final body size of an organism and the proportions of its component tissues and organs. Size-sensing mechanisms that enable cells to maintain their optimal sizes are reviewed, as are the scaling mechanisms that organelles use to adjust their sizes in response to changes in cell size. Examples from across the tree of life--from bacteria to humans--are provided. The authors also describe the mysteries that still remain about cell size and its control, including the nature of the intriguing relationship between nuclear DNA content and cell size. This volume will therefore be fascinating reading for all cell, developmental, and evolutionary biologists.
Author: James H. Brown
Author: James H. Brown
Author: William J. Jungers
Author: Geoffrey West
Author: Thomas T. Samaras
Author: Tamás Vicsek
Author: Knut Schmidt-Nielsen
Author: Karl J. Niklas
Author: 
Author: Trachette Jackson
Author: David Wake