Symmorphosis

Symmorphosis

Author: Ewald R. Weibel

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 9780674000681

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Are animals designed economically? The theory of symmorphosis predicts that the size of the parts in a system must be matched to the overall functional demand. Weibel shows how animals as different as shrews, pronghorns, dogs, goats--even humans--all develop from essentially the same blueprint by variation of design.


Principles of Animal Design

Principles of Animal Design

Author: Ewald R. Weibel

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1998-02-28

Total Pages: 340

ISBN-13: 9780521586672

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The book discusses whether animals are designed according to the same rules that engineers use in building machines.


The Flexible Phenotype

The Flexible Phenotype

Author: Theunis Piersma

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 0199233721

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

In essence, the authors argue for the existence of direct, measurable, links between phenotype and ecology.


Biomechanics and Biology of Movement

Biomechanics and Biology of Movement

Author: Benno Maurus Nigg

Publisher: Human Kinetics

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 496

ISBN-13: 9780736003315

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"A text for upper-level undergraduate and graduate courses in human performance, it uses an integrated scientific approach to explore solutions to problems in human movement. As an interdisciplinary reference volume for biomechanists, exercise physiologists, motor behaviorists, athletic trainers, therapists, kinesiologists, and students, Biomechanics and Biology of Movement offers an in-depth understanding and appreciation of the many factors comprising and affecting human movement. In addition, it will give you the insights and information you require to address and resolve individual performance problems."--BOOK JACKET.


Principles of Human Locomotion

Principles of Human Locomotion

Author: Thomas Rowland

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2020-09-10

Total Pages: 298

ISBN-13: 1527559246

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book addresses how the general principles of biology influence the human capacity for locomotion, and, conversely, how understanding the nature of muscular activity might provide insights into the basic nature of living beings. Through a series of essays, the book relates the evolutionary basis of animal locomotion to recognizing the determinants of exercise capacity. While raising more questions than providing answers, the discussions will assume that without knowing the correct questions to ask, the answers will not be forthcoming. At the root of this book lies the central query: what is it that separates the principles governing the function of living beings from those that dictate the inanimate world? The discussions here address this issue from the expectation that clues to the answer can be obtained through understanding adaptations to the stresses imposed by physical exercise. As such, the book provides thought-provoking analyses of the biological basis of locomotion that will stimulate future efforts to understand these phenomena.


Physiological Ecology

Physiological Ecology

Author: William H. Karasov

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-05-05

Total Pages: 744

ISBN-13: 0691213313

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Unlocking the puzzle of how animals behave and how they interact with their environments is impossible without understanding the physiological processes that determine their use of food resources. But long overdue is a user-friendly introduction to the subject that systematically bridges the gap between physiology and ecology. Ecologists--for whom such knowledge can help clarify the consequences of global climate change, the biodiversity crisis, and pollution--often find themselves wading through an unwieldy, technically top-heavy literature. Here, William Karasov and Carlos Martínez del Rio present the first accessible and authoritative one-volume overview of the physiological and biochemical principles that shape how animals procure energy and nutrients and free themselves of toxins--and how this relates to broader ecological phenomena. After introducing primary concepts, the authors review the chemical ecology of food, and then discuss how animals digest and process food. Their broad view includes symbioses and extends even to ecosystem phenomena such as ecological stochiometry and toxicant biomagnification. They introduce key methods and illustrate principles with wide-ranging vertebrate and invertebrate examples. Uniquely, they also link the physiological mechanisms of resource use with ecological phenomena such as how and why animals choose what they eat and how they participate in the exchange of energy and materials in their biological communities. Thoroughly up-to-date and pointing the way to future research, Physiological Ecology is an essential new source for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students-and an ideal synthesis for professionals. The most accessible introduction to the physiological and biochemical principles that shape how animals use resources Unique in linking the physiological mechanisms of resource use with ecological phenomena An essential resource for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students An ideal overview for researchers


The Pathway for Oxygen

The Pathway for Oxygen

Author: Ewald R. Weibel

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 1984

Total Pages: 448

ISBN-13: 9780674657915

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

It is rare indeed for one book to be both a first-rate classroom text and a major contribution to scholarship. The Pathway for Oxygen is such a book, offering a new approach to respiratory physiology and morphology that quantitatively links the two. Professionalism in science has led to a compartmentalization of biology. Function is the domain of the physiologist, structure that of the morphologist, and they often operate with vastly disparate concepts and procedures. Yet the performance of the respiratory system depends both on structural and on functional properties that cannot be separated. The first chapter of The Pathway for Oxygen engages the student with the design and function of the vertebrate respiratory organs from a comparative viewpoint. The second chapter adds to that foundation the link between cell energetics and oxygen needs of the whole animal. With Chapter 3 the excitement begins--new ideas, fresh attacks on old problems, and a fuller account of the power of the quantitative approach Dr. Weibel has pioneered. The Pathway for Oxygen will be read eagerly by medical students, graduate students, advanced undergraduates in zoology--and by their professors.


Advances in Comparative and Environmental Physiology

Advances in Comparative and Environmental Physiology

Author:

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 309

ISBN-13: 3642785980

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

ADVANCES IN COMPARATIVE AND ENVIRONMENTAL PHYSIOLOGY helps biologists, physiologists, and biochemists keep track of the extensive literature in thefield. Providing comprehensive, integrated reviews and sound, critical, and provocative summaries, this series is a must for all active researchers in environmental and comparative physiology. The present volume contains six reviews on: - Motile Activities of Fish Chromatophores. - Epithelial Transport of Heavy Metals. - Heavy Metal Cytotoxicity in Marine Organisms. - Comparative Pulmonary Morphology and Morphometry. - Molecular Adaptations in Resistance to Penicillins. - Molecular Adaptations of Enzymes From Thermophilic and Psychrophilic Organisms.


Vertebrate Paleobiology

Vertebrate Paleobiology

Author: Sergio F. Vizcaíno

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2024-08-20

Total Pages: 490

ISBN-13: 025307049X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An essential introduction to the paleobiology of animal body size, locomotion, and feeding. Paleobiology is the branch of evolutionary biology involved in the reconstruction of the life histories of extinct organisms. It answers the questions, How do we use fossils to reconstruct the size of prehistoric animals, and How did they move and feed? Drawing on a rich inventory of South American Miocene fossils, Vertebrate Paleobiology: A Form and Function Approach examines different aspects of functional morphology and how they are tested by paleontologists, anatomists, and zoologists. Beginning with a review of various methodologies to interpret fossils, the authors turn to the main concepts important to functional morphology and give examples of each. They conclude by showing how functional morphology enables a dynamic, broadscale reconstruction of the life of prehistoric animals during the South American Miocene. Originally published in Spanish, Vertebrate Paleobiology: A Form and Function Approach provides a broad sweep of recent developments, including theoretical and practical techniques, applied to the study of extinct vertebrates.


New Directions in Ecological Physiology

New Directions in Ecological Physiology

Author: Martin E. Feder

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1987

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 9780521349383

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This 1988 book outlines conceptual approaches to the study of physiological adaptation in animals.