Ontogenetic Allometry of Deposit Feeders

这项提案计划整合两种研究途径 这关系到我们对存款供给者的理解，即 澄清沉积物食物来源的存款 馈线，和发展的理论基础 来解释它们的觅食行为 具体 目标包括：（1）澄清 沉积有机物的吸收率和几个 它的重要成分，包括微生物，微生物粘液， 和吸附的小分子，在进食率方面，肠道 周转时间和吸收时间常数; 2）确定 身体大小和身体形状对特定吸收的影响 速率和特定代谢速率;以及3）确定 内在（大小和形状相关）和 外源性（沉积物中与大小相关的摄食位置） 发展历史中影响净能量增益的因素 一个头朝下的存款送料器。 最重要的方面 建议的研究是，它整合了两个方面， 令人兴奋的，但不同的，海底研究的途径，一个 地球化学控制的粮食供应，另一个在一个 对觅食行为的理解

This proposal plans to integrate two avenues of research that bear on our understanding of deposit - feeders, namely the clarification of the sedimentary food sources used by deposit feeders, and the development of the theoretical underpinning for explaining their foraging behavior. The specific objectives include: 1) clarifying the relationship of absorption rates of sedimentary organic matter and several of its important components, including microbes, microbal mucus, and adsorbed small molecules, in terms of feeding rates, gut turnover times, and absorption time constants; 2) determining the effects of body size and body shape on specific absorption rates and specific metabolic rates; and 3) determining the combined effects of intrinsic (size and shape related) and extrinsic (size related feeding position in the sediment) factors on the net energy gain during the developmental history of a head-down deposit feeder. The most significant aspect of the proposed research is that is integrates aspects of two exciting, but disparate, avenues of benthic research, one on the geochemical control of food availability, the other on an understanding of foraging behavior.