A Master Equation for All Life Processes?

If you are curious about how interesting the world turns out to be, here are two great articles to add to your reading list.

A Master Equation for All Life Processes?. In “Life on the Scales,” Science News
recently wrote that some simple mathematical equations, known as
quarter-power scaling laws, can explain the metabolic rates of living
organisms. For example, “an animal's metabolic rate appears to be
proportional to mass to the 3/4 power.” And this “3/4-power law appears
to hold sway from microbes to whales, creatures of sizes ranging over a
mind-boggling 21 orders of magnitude.” The ecologists, physicists and
chemists behind this research are now successfully applying this
equation to plants, fish, full ecosystems and even biology and
genetics, by adding a new key parameter: temperature. Please read this
fascinating article for many more details and references. But save some
time to read another long article, “Ecology's Big, Hot Idea,” published by PLoS Biology,
which states that “the way life uses energy is a unifying principle for
ecology in the same way that genetics underpins evolutionary biology.”
Read more… [Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends]