Engineering animals : how life works

396 Pages·2011·6.345 MB·English

by  Mark Denny, Alan McFadzean

Engineering Animals

Engineering Animals
h o w l i f e w o r k s
Mark Denny
Alan McFadzean
the belknap press of
harvard university press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
and London, England
2011
Copyright © 2011 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Denny, Mark, 1953–
Engineering animals : how life works / Mark Denny and Alan McFadzean.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-674-04854-6 (alk. paper)
1. Physiology. 2. Animals—Adaptation.
3. Animal ecophysiology. I. McFadzean, Alan, 1958– II. Title.
QP31.2.D46 2011
591.7—dc22 2010051355
Mark dedicates this book to a mammal,
Jane Denny, with love
Alan dedicates this book to his pack:
Anita, Kirsty, and Gordon

Contents

Prologue 1
part one: Structure and Movement

 Go with the Flow 7

 Structural Engineering: Th e Bare Bones 35

 A Moving Experience 58

 A Mind of Its Own 81

 Built for Life 106

 Simple Complexity: Emergent Behavior 130
part two: Remote Sensing

 A Chemical Universe 155

 Sound Ideas 178
viii contents

 Animal Sonar 203

 Seeing the Light 236

 Th ere and Back Again: Animal Navigation 263

 Talk to the Animals 289

Epilogue 313

Notes 317

Further Reading 347

References 351

Acknowledgments 371

Index 373
Engineering Animals