Leatherback thermoregulation
Reports of leatherback turtles swimming actively around ice
floes at sub-arctic latitudes (
Bleakney, 1965; Goff and Lien,
1988
)
–
habitat normally associated with blubber-covered,
endothermic marine mammals
–
have long held the interest of
comparative biologists, physiologists, and the public in general.
Sparked by this interest, several generations of researchers have
studied leatherbacks' special physiological adaptations for
thermoregulation and the role of metabolism in particular.
However, the current status of leatherback thermoregulation
research is somewhat reminiscent of the
‘
blind man and the
elephant
’
anecdote, in which a blind man's characterization of
an elephant is limited to the portion of the elephant's body (i.e.,
its trunk, its leg, etc.) that he can immediately examine, and thus
his myopic perspective renders him unable to
‘
see
’
the elephant
in its entirety. In this sense, a cohesive, integrated characteriza-
tion of leatherback thermoregulation appears lacking. Here, we
synthesize this body of research to provide a holistic perspective
of leatherback thermal biology
Leatherback thermoregulation
Reports of leatherback turtles swimming actively around ice
floes at sub-arctic latitudes (
Bleakney, 1965; Goff and Lien,
1988
)
–
habitat normally associated with blubber-covered,
endothermic marine mammals
–
have long held the interest of
comparative biologists, physiologists, and the public in general.
Sparked by this interest, several generations of researchers have
studied leatherbacks' special physiological adaptations for
thermoregulation and the role of metabolism in particular.
However, the current status of leatherback thermoregulation
research is somewhat reminiscent of the
‘
blind man and the
elephant
’
anecdote, in which a blind man's characterization of
an elephant is limited to the portion of the elephant's body (i.e.,
its trunk, its leg, etc.) that he can immediately examine, and thus
his myopic perspective renders him unable to
‘
see
’
the elephant
in its entirety. In this sense, a cohesive, integrated characteriza-
tion of leatherback thermoregulation appears lacking. Here, we
synthesize this body of research to provide a holistic perspective
of leatherback thermal biology
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