CHAPTER

1
Introduction to
Physiological
Principles

PowerPoint® Lecture Slides prepared by

Stephen Gehnrich, Salisbury University

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 Physiology

“The study of how animals work”

Knut Schmidt-Nielsen (1915–2007)

Structure and function of various parts

 How these parts work together
Diversity of animals
 More than 1 million species live on Earth
Unifying themes
 Apply to all physiological processes

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 History of Animal Physiology

Hippocrates (460–circa 377 B.C.)

 Father of medicine
 Careful observation
Aristotle (384–322 B.C.)
 Father of natural history
 Relationship between structure and function
Claudius Galenus, “Galen” (129–circa 199)
 First experimental physiologist

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 History of Animal Physiology

Ibn al-Nafis (1213–1288)

 Anatomy of heart and lungs
Jean-Francois Fernal (1497–1558)
 Outlined current knowledge of human health and
disease
Andreas Vesalius (1514–1564)
 First modern anatomy textbook
William Harvey (1578–1657)
 Circulation of blood through the body by
contractions of the heart
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 History of Animal Physiology

Herman Boerhaave and Albrecht von Haller (1700s)

 Bodily functions are a combination of chemical and
physical processes
 Prior to this all physiologists were either
 Latrochemists (body functions involved only chemical
reactions)
 Latrophysicists (body functions involved only
physical processes)

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 History of Animal Physiology

Matthias Schleiden and Theodor Schwann (1838)

 “Cell theory”
Claude Bernard (1813–1878)
 Milieu interieur (internal environment)
 Internal environment distinct from external
environment
Walter Cannon (1871–1945)
 “Homeostasis”

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 History of Animal Physiology

Per Scholander (1905–1980)

 Comparative physiology
C. Ladd Prosser (1907–2002)
 Central pattern generators
Knut Schmidt-Nielsen (1915–2007)
 Animals in harsh and unusual environments

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 History of Animal Physiology

George Bartholomew (1923–2006)

 Ecological physiology
Peter Hochachka (1937–2002) and George Somero
(1941– )
 Biochemical adaptations

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 Physiological Subdisciplines

Based on
 Biological level of organization
 Process that causes physiological variation
 Ultimate goals of the research
 Many physiological questions encompass elements
from each subdiscipline

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 Biological Level of Organization

 Cell and molecular physiology

 Genetics, metabolism, organelles
 Systems physiology
 Function of organs
 Organismal physiology
 Whole animal
 Ecological physiology
 Animal and its environment
 Integrative physiology
 Multiple levels of organization

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 Biological Level of Organization

Figure 1.2
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 Biological Level of Organization

Physiologists often study processes at more than one

level
 Reductionism – understand a system by studying
the function of its parts
 Emergence – the whole is more than the sum of its
parts

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 Process that Causes Physiological Variation

 Developmental physiology
 Change as animal grows
 Environmental physiology
 Change in response to environment
 Evolutionary physiology
 Change due to natural selection

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 Ultimate Goals of the Research

 Pure physiology
 No specific goal, other than knowledge
 Applied physiology
 Medical physiology
 Comparative physiology
 August Krogh principle – “For every biological
system there is an organism on which it can be most
conveniently studied”

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 Unifying Themes in Physiology

 Physiological processes obey physical and

chemical laws
 Physiological processes are usually regulated
 Homeostasis – maintenance of internal constancy
 Physiological phenotype is a product of genotype
and environment
 Genotype – genetic makeup
 Phenotype – morphology, physiology, and behavior
 Genotype is the product of evolution

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 Unifying Themes in Physiology

Table 1.1
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 Physics and Chemistry

 Physical properties of cells and tissue are linked to

structure and function
 Molecular interactions are governed by chemical
laws
 Thermodynamics and kinetics
 Electrical laws describe membrane function;
especially excitable cells
 Nerves and muscles
 Body size influences physiological patterns
 Allometric scaling

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 Physics and Chemistry

Figure 1.3
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 Physiological Regulation

Strategies for coping with changing conditions

 Conformers – allow internal conditions to change
with external conditions
 Regulators – maintain relatively constant internal
conditions regardless of external conditions

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 Homeostasis

Maintenance of internal conditions in the face of

environmental perturbations
Controlled by feedback loops or reflex control
pathways
 Negative feedback loops
 Positive feedback loops

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 Homeostasis

Figure 1.4
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 Phenotype, Genotype, and the Environment

Phenotype is a product of genotype and its

interaction with the environment
 Genotype – genetic makeup
 Phenotype – morphology, physiology, and behavior
 Phenotypic plasticity – single genotype generates
more than one phenotype depending on
environmental conditions

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 Factors Influencing Phenotype

Figure 1.1
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 Phenotype, Genotype, and the Environment

Figure 1.5
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 Phenotypic Plasticity

Can be irreversible or reversible

 Irreversible
 Polyphenism – developmental plasticity
 Reversible
 Acclimation – under laboratory conditions
 Acclimatization – natural environment

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 Physiology and Evolution

Diversity of anatomic and physiologic strategies

animals use to cope with their environment
Two types of questions
 Proximate cause
 How did these develop?
 Ultimate cause
 Why are these changes helpful?

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 Adaptation

Two distinct meanings

 Change in a population over evolutionary time
(i.e., many generations)
 Most common usage
 Definition used in this book
 Synonym for acclimation
 Many argue this is an incorrect usage

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 Basis for Evolution and Natural Selection

 Variation among individuals for specific traits

 Traits must be heritable
 Traits must increase fitness
 That is, must increase reproductive success
 Relative fitness of different genotypes depends on
the environment
 If the environment changes, the trait may no longer be
beneficial

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 Not All Differences are Adaptations

Genetic drift
 Random changes in the frequency of genotypes
over time
 Independent of adaptive evolution
 Most common in small populations
 For example, forest fire resulting in founder effect

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 Evolutionary Relationships

 Despite the diversity in animal form and function,

there are many similarities
 Common evolutionary ancestors
 Closely related species share more features than
distantly related species
 Understanding evolution is necessary to
understanding physiological diversity

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