Animal Body Size
Animal Body Size

Author: Felisa A. Smith

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2013-08-09

Total Pages: 281

ISBN-13: 022601228X

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Galileo wrote that “nature cannot produce a horse as large as twenty ordinary horses or a giant ten times taller than an ordinary man unless by miracle or by greatly altering the proportions of his limbs and especially of his bones”—a statement that wonderfully captures a long-standing scientific fascination with body size. Why are organisms the size that they are? And what determines their optimum size? This volume explores animal body size from a macroecological perspective, examining species, populations, and other large groups of animals in order to uncover the patterns and causal mechanisms of body size throughout time and across the globe. The chapters represent diverse scientific perspectives and are divided into two sections. The first includes chapters on insects, snails, birds, bats, and terrestrial mammals and discusses the body size patterns of these various organisms. The second examines some of the factors behind, and consequences of, body size patterns and includes chapters on community assembly, body mass distribution, life history, and the influence of flight on body size.

Human Body Size and the Laws of Scaling
Human Body Size and the Laws of Scaling

Author: Thomas T. Samaras

Publisher: Nova Publishers

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13: 9781600214080

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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.

The Ecological Implications of Body Size
The Ecological Implications of Body Size

Author: Robert Henry Peters

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1986-03-31

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 9780521288866

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Describes in detail how the physical size of an organism affects its biology. Presents the largest single compilation of inter-specific size relations and instructs the reader on their comparison, combination, and criticism.

Body Size: The Structure and Function of Aquatic Ecosystems
Body Size: The Structure and Function of Aquatic Ecosystems

Author: Alan G. Hildrew

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2007-07-12

Total Pages: 335

ISBN-13: 1139464175

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Ecologists have long struggled to predict features of ecological systems, such as the numbers and diversity of organisms. The wide range of body sizes in ecological communities, from tiny microbes to large animals and plants, is emerging as the key to prediction. Based on the relationship between body size and features such as biological rates, the physics of water and the amount of habitat available, we may be able to understand patterns of abundance and diversity, biogeography, interactions in food webs and the impact of fishing, adding up to a potential 'periodic table' for ecology. Remarkable progress on the unravelling, describing and modelling of aquatic food webs, revealing the fundamental role of body size, makes a book emphasising marine and freshwater ecosystems particularly apt. In this 2007 book, the importance of body size is examined at a range of scales that will be of interest to professional ecologists, from students to senior researchers.

Body Size in Mammalian Paleobiology
Body Size in Mammalian Paleobiology

Author: John Douglas Damuth

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1990-11-30

Total Pages: 416

ISBN-13: 9780521360999

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There is a growing interest in the biological implications of body size in animals. This parameter is now being used to make inferences and predictions about not only the habits and habitat of a particular species, but also as a way to understand patterns and biases in the fossil record. This valuable collection of essays presents and evaluates techniques of body-mass estimation and reviews current and potential applications of body-size estimates in paleobiology. Coverage is particularly detailed for carnivores, primates and ungulates, but information is also presented on marsupials, rodents and proboscideans. Body Size in Mammalian Paleobiology will prove useful to researchers and graduate students in paleontology, mammalogy, ecology and evolution programmes. It is designed to be both a practical handbook for researchers making and using body-size estimates, and a sourcebook of ideas for applying body size to paleontological problems and directions for future research.

The Role of Body Size in Multispecies Systems
The Role of Body Size in Multispecies Systems

Author: Andrea Belgrano

Publisher: Academic Press

Published: 2011-11-16

Total Pages: 349

ISBN-13: 0123864755

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This thematic volume represents an important and exciting benchmark in the study of integrative ecology, synthesizing and showcasing current research and highlighting future directions for the development of the field.

Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies
Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies

Author: Michael Gard

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-12-30

Total Pages: 582

ISBN-13: 1000511391

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The Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies is an authoritative and challenging guide to the breadth and depth of critical thinking and theory on obesity. Rather than focusing on obesity as a public health crisis to be solved, this reference work offers divergent and radical strategies alongside biomedical and positivist discourses. Comprised of thirty nine original chapters from internationally recognised academics, as well as emerging scholars, the Handbook engages students, academics, researchers and practitioners in contemporary critical scholarship on obesity; encourages engagement of social science and related disciplines in critical thinking and theorising on obesity; enhances critical theoretical and methodological work in the area, highlighting potential gaps as well as strengths; relates critical scholarship to new and evolving areas of obesity-related practices, policies and research. This multidisciplinary and international collection is designed for a broad audience of academics, researchers, students and practitioners within the social and health sciences, including sociology, obesity science, public health, medicine, sports studies, fat studies, psychology, nutrition science, education and disability studies.

The Role of Visual Cues in Body Size Estimation
The Role of Visual Cues in Body Size Estimation

Author: Anne Thaler

Publisher: Logos Verlag Berlin GmbH

Published: 2019-12-15

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 3832550267

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Our body is central to what we define as our self. The mental representation of our physical appearance, often called body image, can have a great influence on our psychological health. Given the increase in body mass index worldwide and the societal pressure to conform to body ideals, it is important to gain a better understanding of the nature of body representations and factors that play a role in body size estimation tasks. This doctoral thesis takes a multifaceted approach for investigating the role of different visual cues in the estimation of own body size and shape by using a variety of experimental methods and novel state-of-the-art computer graphics methods. Two visual cues were considered: visual perspective and identity cues in the visual appearance of a body (shape, and color-information), as well as their interactions with own body size and gender. High ecological validity was achieved by testing body size estimation in natural settings, when looking into a mirror, and by generating biometrically plausible virtual bodies based on 3D body scans and statistical body models, and simulating real-world scenarios in immersive virtual reality.