Warmer environment means shorter lives for cold-blooded animals
Monday, July 27, 2009 - 16:35
in Biology & Nature
Temperature explains much of why cold-blooded organisms such as fish, amphibians, crustaceans, and lizards live longer at higher latitudes than at lower latitudes, according to research published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) online. Assistant Professor Dr. Stephan Munch and Ph.D. candidate Santiago Salinas, both of Stony Brook University's School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (SoMAS), found that for a diverse range of species whose body temperatures vary with the temperature of their surroundings, ambient temperature is the dominant factor controlling geographic variation of lifespan within species.