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Overview

This topic uses an integrative approach to understand the range of physiological systems that determine how animals and plants maintain their internal environment (i.e. water and ionic relations, circulation, nutrient acquisition, growth, circadian rhythms) in response to a broad range of external environments, with particular focus on difficult external environments … For more content click the Read More button below.

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Aims

After completing this topic, students should have a basic understanding of how animal and plant physiology influences their perception of and response to the external environment. Students should also be able to integrate their physiological understanding to a range of real-life challenges faced by plants and animals. Students will work on two practical-based research projects, in which they will learn about the collection of physiological data, their analysis, and presentation in a formal report and poster. They will present the content they have learned in lectures through popular-science style summaries.

Learning outcomes

On completion of this topic you will be expected to be able to:
1.
Understand the physiological function (including the associated anatomy) that animals and plants rely on to survive in their external environments
2.
Integrate knowledge of the physiological constraints of animals and plants to produce new predictions from unfamiliar examples.
3.
Be able to derive and justify hypotheses of how evolution has influenced the multitude of physiological alternatives observed in the natural world
4.
Assess and summarise unfamiliar examples of animal and plant physiology from the literature through generalising concepts taught in the lectures.
5.
Design and interpret appropriate statistical testing procedures to test a physiological research hypothesis
6.
Report on monitoring of animal and plant physiological function in the context of critical hypothesis appraisal in two research reports.

Assessments

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Current students should refer to FLO for detailed assessment information, including due dates. Assessment information is accurate at the time of publishing.

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Requisites information

Pre-requisites: