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News and Views
Nature 397, 651-653 (25 February 1999) | doi:10.1038/17687
Bioenergetics: One price to run, swim or fly?
R. McNeill Alexander1
It has long been accepted that it is metabolically cheaper for animals to fly than to run, and cheaper still for them to swim1. Measurements of oxygen consumption have shown, in comparisons between animals of equal mass, that the energy used by a mammal to run one kilometre is enough to enable a bird to fly about two kilometres, or a fish to swim up to ten kilometres.
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