Modeling Endotherm Performance
Modeling Endotherm Performance
Linking heat balance to performance, species distributions, and climate responses.
Endotherms maintain body temperature through internal heat production, but the energetic costs of doing so vary dramatically across environments. We study how heat exchange shapes performance and use those mechanisms to predict distributions, range limits, and responses to climate change.
Thermal performance and heat balance
Thermal performance curves are widely used to describe how temperature shapes organismal function, but there are few broadly applicable frameworks for endotherms. Because endotherms actively regulate body temperature, performance depends not simply on environmental temperature but on the balance of heat exchange between organisms and their environments.
Our work proposes that performance in endotherms can be understood using net sensible heat flux. When heat gain and heat loss are balanced, thermoregulatory costs are minimized, producing a natural prediction for the environmental conditions where performance is highest.
- Heat exchange: net sensible heat flux between organism and environment
- Thermal balance: minimal metabolic costs of thermoregulation
- Optimal performance: predicted to occur near heat balance
In endotherms, optimal performance may occur where environmental heat exchange minimizes thermoregulatory costs.
Species distributions and climate responses
Because heat balance depends on both organismal traits and environmental conditions, this framework can be used to predict how endotherms perform across landscapes and through time. By linking physiology to climate data, we can identify where animals experience favorable thermal environments and where thermoregulatory costs become limiting.
- Spatial predictions: mapping thermal performance across landscapes
- Temporal dynamics: seasonal and daily variation in heat balance
- Climate change: forecasting shifts in suitable environments
Can heat balance provide a mechanistic link between physiology, climate, and the geographic distributions of endothermic animals?