Skip Navigation

American Zoologist 1990 30(1):111-121; doi:10.1093/icb/30.1.111
© 1990 by The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Request Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by DENNY, M. W.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

Terrestrial Versus Aquatic Biology: The Medium and Its Message1

MARK W. DENNY
Hopkins Marine Station of Stanford University Pacific Grove, California 93950

Many basic biological functions are constrained by the physical properties of the fluids in which organisms live. Here I explore four selected examples in which physical differences between air and water have contributed to the functional divergence of terrestrial and aquatic organisms. 1. Water is about 800 times as dense as air. As a result, while the cost of locomotion is generally less for aquatic organisms, the hydrodynamic forces they encounter are larger. 2. The combined effects of density and viscosity insure that the capture of suspended particles is mechanically more effective on land than in water. 3. The speed of sound is four times greater in water than in air, requiring aquatic organisms to use higher frequency sounds in echolocation systems. 4. The resistivity of air is 16 orders of magnitude larger than that of seawater, which might explain why aquatic animals use electrical sensing organs to detect prey but terrestrial animals do not.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 J. Exp. Biol.Home page
B. E. Flammang and G. V. Lauder
Speed-dependent intrinsic caudal fin muscle recruitment during steady swimming in bluegill sunfish, Lepomis macrochirus
J. Exp. Biol., February 15, 2008; 211(4): 587 - 598.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.