A PHYSIOLOGICAL-BASIS OF POPULATION PROCESSES - ECOTOXICOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS

Explores models that provide the basis of links between physiological and population processes and points out implications for the application of physiological bioassays in ecotoxicology. Scope for growth is the difference between energy intake and total metabolic losses and hence is equivalent to production rate in the standard energy budget. When scope for growth is zero or negative, there can be no growth and reproduction, and hence though conditions need not be immediately lethal, they will limit distribution. Similarly, by directly influencing growth and reproduction, scope for growth ought to correlate positively with abundance. -from Authors