Modelling temperature-dependency in biology by generalizing temperature coefficient Q(10)

Temperature is an important biological factor and affects numerous biologic al processes and phenomena. Many models have been proposed to describe the effects of temperature on these biological processes. In this paper, I deve lop a general temperature and time-dependent model of the state of a biolog ical process as a function of temperature and time. This model generalizes that underlying temperature coefficient and can be used to estimate its par ameters from data on the state, temperature and time, or on any two of the three quantities, given the other fixed. To demonstrate its utility in data analysis, I use a special case to estimate some parameters from data on th e duration of one mitotic cycle during synchronous cleavage divisions of th e rainbow trout Salmo gairdneri and the Russian sturgeon Acipenser guldenst adti as a function of water temperature. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.