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The roles of body mass and gravity in determining the energy requirements of homoiothermsStudies by Kleiber and by Brody in the 1930's established the 3/4 power of body weight as the unit of metabolic size for homoiotherms. Later Kleiber conceived of the energy requirement as a composite function, with a thermoregulatory component that is proportional to heat loss, and an antigravity component that is directly proportional to body weight. Maintenance feed requirements (F) have been measured with groups of small animals chronically exposed to several acceleration fields (G). Analysis of the results leads to an arithmetic relationship between the maintenance requirement and acceleration field strength: F sub G = F sub 0 + kG. When the equations are compared for groups of different body size, F sub 0 tends to vary between the 0.4 and 0.5 power of body mass - and k tends to be the same, irrespective of body mass. These findings tend to confirm the Kleiber concept of a composite nature of homoiotherm maintenance requirements.
Document ID
19770063003
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Smith, A. H.
(California, University Davis, Calif., United States)
Date Acquired
August 9, 2013
Publication Date
June 1, 1977
Subject Category
Life Sciences (General)
Meeting Information
Meeting: Plenary Meeting
Location: Tel Aviv
Country: Israel
Start Date: June 7, 1977
End Date: June 18, 1977
Sponsors: COSPAR
Accession Number
77A45855
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NGR-05-004-008
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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