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  • Brief Communication
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Physiology (communication arising)

Allometric cascades

Abstract

An allometric power-law relationship between metabolic rate and the mass of living organisms has been observed over many orders of magnitude in mass, indicating that (among other things) a characteristic mass scale is not applicable. Darveau et al.1 present a multiple-cause cascade model of metabolic allometry, which has been hailed as a new perspective on comparative integrative physiology2 and scaling relationships3. Here we show that this cascade model is flawed and is therefore meaningless both for control of metabolic rate in an organism of a given size and for scaling of the metabolic rate.

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References

  1. Darveau, C.-A., Suarez, R. K., Andrews, R. D. & Hochachka, P. W. Nature 417, 166–170 (2002).

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  2. Weibel, E. R. Nature 417, 131–132 (2002).

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  4. Hochachka, P. W. & Somero, G. N. Biochemical Adaptation: Mechanism and Process in Physiological Evolution (Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 2001).

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Correspondence to Jayanth R. Banavar.

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Banavar, J., Damuth, J., Maritan, A. et al. Allometric cascades. Nature 421, 713–714 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/421713b

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