Hou Chen, Zuo Wenyun, Moses Melanie E, Woodruff William H, Brown James H, West Geoffrey B
Santa Fe Institute, 1399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA.
Science. 2008 Oct 31;322(5902):736-9. doi: 10.1126/science.1162302.
All organisms face the problem of how to fuel ontogenetic growth. We present a model, empirically grounded in data from birds and mammals, that correctly predicts how growing animals allocate food energy between synthesis of new biomass and maintenance of existing biomass. Previous energy budget models have typically had their bases in rates of either food consumption or metabolic energy expenditure. Our model provides a framework that reconciles these two approaches and highlights the fundamental principles that determine rates of food assimilation and rates of energy allocation to maintenance, biosynthesis, activity, and storage. The model predicts that growth and assimilation rates for all animals should cluster closely around two universal curves. Data for mammals and birds of diverse body sizes and taxa support these predictions.
所有生物都面临着如何为个体发育生长提供能量的问题。我们提出了一个基于鸟类和哺乳动物数据的实证模型，该模型能正确预测生长中的动物如何在新生物量合成与现有生物量维持之间分配食物能量。先前的能量预算模型通常基于食物消耗率或代谢能量消耗率。我们的模型提供了一个框架，调和了这两种方法，并突出了决定食物同化率以及能量分配到维持、生物合成、活动和储存的速率的基本原理。该模型预测，所有动物的生长率和同化率应紧密聚集在两条通用曲线上。不同体型和分类群的哺乳动物和鸟类的数据支持了这些预测。
