Adaptation to Environment

Book excerpt: Adaptation to Environment: Essays on the Physiology of Marine Animals contains a series of essays that is intended as a review of the special adaptations of marine organisms to the particular environmental conditions they are likely to encounter in the natural habitat. This book emphasizes developments in physiology of marine animals and on approaches to the study of the adaptations of marine organisms. This compilation also interprets the term "Physiology in its widest sense to include all aspects of the functioning of the organism from the behavior of animals to the mode of function of enzymes. For this reason, structural adaptations have been reviewed in detail only where their functional role is understood and where they constitute a specific adaptation to defined environmental conditions. This publication benefits students and individuals conducting research on the physiology of marine animals.