Symposium: Mechanics of Plants, Animals and their Environments: Integrative Perspectives January 11-16, 1998 Santa Barbara, California

研讨会将汇集高度跨学科的生物学家、物理科学家（化学家、物理学家、数学家）和工程师，介绍和讨论与植物、动物及其环境有关的流体、固体、流体力学和动力学现象。感兴趣的长度尺度范围从单个细胞到整个生物体，再到它们的宿主环境，这意味着长度尺度比超过10'2，包括微观（分子）和宏观（大气）力的极端情况。许多不同的现象都可以用一套共同的物理定律来描述。它们包括折断树枝、蚂蚁举起重物、蜘蛛感知振动、风传播种子或化学污染物、鸟和昆虫的飞行、鱼的游泳、通过血细胞运输氧气、树液的上升、投弹甲虫排出的热化学物质、蝴蝶翅膀拦截太阳辐射。飞蛾体内信息素羽的传播和感知，水黾在水面上的运动，海洋动物的滤食，昆虫的声音产生，单细胞及其膜和骨骼的力学，节肢动物外骨骼的物理化学特性，血液在大血管和毛细血管中流动的力学，与功能相关的某些生物形式的优化。这提供了一种自然的方法来分析各种各样的生物现象，否则这些现象可能看起来完全不相关；一种发现它们之间潜在的共性的方法，不是在传统的生物学领域，而是在影响它们的物理环境方面。

Humphrey 9727180 The Symposium will bring together a highly interdisciplinary mix of biologists, physical scientists (chemists, physicists, mathematicians) and engineers to present and discuss fluid-, solid-, them~o-mechanics and dynamics phenomena related to plants, animals, and their environments. The length scale range of interest spans single cells, to entire organisms, to their host environments, implying length scale ratios exceeding 10'2 and including the extremes of micro (molecular) and macro (atmosphericJoceanographic) forces. Many disparate phenomena are described by a common set of physical laws. They include the breaking of a limb from a tree, the lifting of a load by an ant, the sensing of vibrations by a spider, the dispersion of seeds or chemical pollutants by the wind, the flight of birds and insects, the swimming of fish, the transportation of oxygen via blood cells, the rising of sap in trees, the hot chemical discharge from the bombardier beetle, the solar radiation interception by a butterfly's wings, the dispersal and sensing of pheromone plumes in moths, the locomotion of water striders on water surfaces, filter feeding in marine animals, insect sound production, the mechanics of single cells and their membranes and skeletons, the physico-chemicai properties of arthropod exoskeletons, the mechanics of blood flow through large blood vessels and in capillaries, the optima of certain organismal forms in relation to function. This provides a natural way to analyze a diverse collection of biological phenomena that might otherwise: appear totally unrelated; a way to find underlying commonalities among them, not in the traditional biological areas, but in terms of the physics that affect them in their environments.