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In physiology, thermoception or thermoreception is the sensation and perception of temperature, or more accurately, temperature differences inferred from heat flux.It deals with a series of events and processes required for an organism to receive a temperature stimulus, convert it to a molecular signal, and recognize and characterize the signal in order to trigger an appropriate defense response.
The physiology of underwater diving is the physiological adaptations to diving of air-breathing vertebrates that have returned to the ocean from terrestrial lineages. They are a diverse group that include sea snakes, sea turtles, the marine iguana, saltwater crocodiles, penguins, pinnipeds, cetaceans, sea otters, manatees and dugongs.
What is commonly called a pit organ allows these animals to essentially "see" [1] radiant heat at wavelengths between 5 and 30 μm. The more advanced infrared sense of pit vipers allows these animals to strike prey accurately even in the absence of light, and detect warm objects from several meters away.
Humans are some of the best long distance runners in the animal kingdom; [6] some hunter gatherer tribes practice this form of hunting into the modern era. [7] [8] [9] Homo sapiens have the proportionally longest legs of all known human species, [3] [10] [11] but all members of genus Homo have cursorial (limbs adapted for running) adaptions not seen in more arboreal hominids such as ...
An ectotherm (from the Greek ἐκτός (ektós) "outside" and θερμός (thermós) "heat"), more commonly referred to as a "cold-blooded animal", [1] is an animal in which internal physiological sources of heat, such as blood, are of relatively small or of quite negligible importance in controlling body temperature. [2]
Heat loss is a major threat to smaller creatures, as they have a larger ratio of surface area to volume. Small warm-blooded animals have insulation in the form of fur or feathers. Aquatic warm-blooded animals, such as seals, generally have deep layers of blubber under the skin and any pelage (fur) that they might have; both contribute to their ...
More broadly, the researchers argue, tracking wildlife is important in understanding the unpredictable ways animals adapt to that changing planet — and a vital tool for ecology in the future ...
A cold weather strategy is to temporarily decrease metabolic rate, decreasing the temperature difference between the animal and the air and thereby minimizing heat loss. Furthermore, having a lower metabolic rate is less energetically expensive. Many animals survive cold frosty nights through torpor, a short-term temporary drop in body ...