Principles of Thermal Ecology: Temperature, Energy and Life

· Oxford University Press
Ebook
464
Pages
Eligible
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About this ebook

Temperature affects everything. It influences all aspects of the physical environment and governs any process that involves a flow of energy, setting boundaries on what an organism can or cannot do. This novel textbook reveals the key principles behind the complex relationship between organisms and temperature, namely the science of thermal ecology. It starts by providing a rigorous framework for understanding the flow of energy in and out of the organism, before describing the influence of temperature on what organisms can do and how fast they can do it. With these fundamental principles covered, the bulk of the book explores thermal ecology itself, incorporating the important extra dimension of interactions with other organisms. An entire chapter is devoted to the crucially important subject of how organisms are responding to climate change. Indeed, the threat of rapid climatic change on a global scale is a stark reminder of the challenges that remain for evolutionary thermal biologists, and adds a sense of urgency to this book's mission.

About the author

Andrew Clarke studied zoology and geology at Cambridge University, spending the summer of 1968 supporting geological fieldwork in Svalbard. After graduating from Cambridge University in 1970 he joined the British Antarctic Survey and spent the next 40 years working in South Georgia, the South Orkney Islands, the Antarctic Peninsula, and the Antarctic continent with the occasional return trip to Svalbard, and retired in 2010. His main ecological interests centre on how animals and plants relate to temperature. He has worked primarily with marine invertebrates and fish, but also on birds, mammals, and most recently dinosaurs. He has written over 180 scientific papers.

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