Metabolism drives various biological processes, potentially influencing the ecological success and evolutionary fitness of species. Understanding diverse metabolic rates is fundamental in biology. Mechanisms underlying adaptation to factors like temperature and predation pressure remain unclear.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPhilos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci
February 2024
Metabolism energizes all biological processes, and its tempo may importantly influence the ecological success and evolutionary fitness of organisms. Therefore, understanding the broad variation in metabolic rate that exists across the living world is a fundamental challenge in biology. To further the development of a more reliable and holistic picture of the causes of this variation, we review several examples of how various intrinsic (biological) and extrinsic (environmental) factors (including body size, cell size, activity level, temperature, predation and other diverse genetic, cellular, morphological, physiological, behavioural and ecological influences) can interactively affect metabolic rate in synergistic or antagonistic ways.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIndividual body size distributions (ISD) within communities are remarkably consistent across habitats and spatiotemporal scales and can be represented by size spectra, which are described by a power law. The focus of size spectra analysis is to estimate the exponent ( ) of the power law. A common application of size spectra studies is to detect anthropogenic pressures.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe blue crab Callinectes sapidus (Rathbun, 1896) is one of the most invasive species in the Mediterranean Sea. Understand how the populations are maintained and how the environment is driving the populations in the areas invaded is the key to an effective future management. This current study is presenting a monthly long-term monitoring of the blue crabs' population structure, body size, sexual maturity, reproduction periods and fecundity, and their relationships with environmental factors in a saltmarshes system in Italy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEchinococcosis is a life-threatening neglected zoonotic disease. Cystic echinococcosis (CE) due to Echinococcus (E.) granulosus usually involves livestock and dogs; alveolar echinococcosis (AE) due to E.
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