The scaling of metabolic rate: a comparison between predictions based on DEB theory and other approaches

Abstract

"Various well-known growth models, including the Bertalanffy model, the models developed within the framework of the Metabolic Theory of Ecology (MTE), and the standard DEB model, will be introduced and compared, with special emphasis on the interspecific scaling of the model parameters. At first sight, it seems that MTE and DEB would come up with assumptions that give rise to totally contradictory predictions concerning the relationship between metabolic rate and ultimate size. Whereas DEB points to the area-specific assimilation rate as the characteristic that differs among species of different ultimate size, MTE thinks that differences in ultimate size are basically due to differences in the volume-specific maintenance. Further explorations, however, yield the surprising result that under certain conditions both theories predict a similar relationship between metabolic rate and ultimate mass. "Various well-known growth models, including the Bertalanffy model, the models developed within the framework of the Metabolic Theory of Ecology (MTE), and the standard DEB model, will be introduced and compared, with special emphasis on the interspecific scaling of the model parameters. At first sight, it seems that MTE and DEB would come up with assumptions that give rise to totally contradictory predictions concerning the relationship between metabolic rate and ultimate size. Whereas DEB points to the area-specific assimilation rate as the characteristic that differs among species of different ultimate size, MTE thinks that differences in ultimate size are basically due to differences in the volume-specific maintenance. Further explorations, however, yield the surprising result that under certain conditions both theories predict a similar relationship between metabolic rate and ultimate mass. "