Mass scale and curvature in metabolic scaling. Comment on: T. Kolokotrones et al., curvature in metabolic scaling, Nature 464 (2010) 753-756.

摘要

The relationship between Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) and mass (M) has long been observed to display approximate power-law scaling, BMR ocMk, with typically 2/3 < k < 3/4. Scaling of surface area with mass for self-similar animals suggests k=2/3, while Kleiber's, 1932's, 1947 (empirical) law is k=3/4, and may be related to models of branching networks (West et al., 1997). Arguments for both values continue to be put forward (White and Seymour, 2003; Farrell-Gray and Gotelli, 2005), and the issue remains highly controversial (Agutter and Wheatley, 2004; White and Seymour, 2005; Isaac and Carbone, 2010).