The purpose of this study was to assess the validity and reliability of the MedGem device to measure resting metabolic rate (RMR) in children. Subjects included 59 children (29 boys, 30 girls; mean age, 11.0 +/- 0.2 y). Subjects were given 4 RMR tests during 1 test session, cconsisting of 2 Douglas bag and 2 MedGem tests, in random counterbalanced order. No significant differences were found be...

Flight is an essential biological ability of many insects, but is energetically costly. Environments under rapid human-induced change are characterized by habitat fragmentation and may impose constraints on the energy income budget of organisms. This may, in turn, affect locomotor performance and willingness to fly. We tested flight performance and metabolic rates in meadow brown butterflies (M...

During winter, free-living herbivores are often exposed to reduced energy supply at the same time that energy needs for thermoregulation increase. Several wild herbivores as well as robust horse breeds reduce their metabolism during times of low ambient temperature and food shortage. Thyroid hormones (THs) affect metabolic intensity and a positive effect of THs on basal metabolic rate (BMR) has...

In geographically widespread ectotherms, variation in life history phenotypes may be caused by differences in maintenance metabolism of individuals. I estimated daily and annual maintenance metabolism of eastern fence lizards, Sceloporus undulatus, from two populations with markedly different life histories; lizards in South Carolina grow faster, mature earlier, and have greater annual reproduc...

OBJECTIVE Resting metabolic rate (RMR) is known to be proportional to body weight and to follow allometric scaling principles. We hypothesized that RMR can be predicted from an allometric formula with weight alone as an independent variable. RESEARCH METHODS AND PROCEDURES An allometric, power-law scaling model was fit to RMR measurements obtained from a cohort of patients being treated for w...

In the obesity research literature and in the mass media, a reduced metabolic rate is probably one of the most frequently cited causes of obesity. In the current issue of Obesity Research (pp. 351–359), Luke et al. (1) describe the results of a fascinating study that examined this hypothesis. Specifically, they examined whether genetically related people of West African origin, living in vastly...

The resting metabolic rate (RMR) and the thermic effect of a meal (TEM) were measured in a group of 16 prepubertal (8.8 +/- 0.3 y) obese children (43.6 +/- 9.2 kg) and compared with a group of 10 age-matched (8.6 +/- 0.4 y), normal-weight children (31.0 +/- 6.0 kg). The RMR was higher in the obese than in the control children (4971 +/- 485 vs 4519 +/- 326 kJ/d, P < 0.05); after the RMR was adju...

Intra-specific variation in life history and mating strategies can lead to differences in energy allocation and expenditure in males and females. This may, in turn, explain large-scale evolutionary patterns. In this study, I investigated the effects of body mass, temperature and sex on resting metabolic rates (RMRs) in sexually mature male and female tarantulas (Aphonopelma anax (Chamberlin)), ...

Sodium azide has been employed as a metabolic inhibitor in a variety of studies. Stannard has described the use of this agent in distinguishing between the oxygen consumption of resting as opposed to working frog muscle (1). The increased respiration due to activity was abolished by azide, while the basal resting value was unaffected. Azide has also been shown to interfere with the phosphorylat...