Adaptive Physiology

Learning Outcomes

Learning Outcomes

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

• design, carry out and present a group-based literature research project.
• explain the relationship between animal physiology, temperature and the external environment and adaptations to survival in an extended range of temperatures;
• discuss regulatory mechanisms underlying feeding behaviour
• critically discuss adaptive physiological changes associated with developmental transitions using changes in respiration and circulation at birth in humans as examples.
• describe the functions and design of circulatory systems in a wide range of animal groups;
• illustrate the physiological adaptations developed by animals that allow them to remain submerged for prolonged periods;
• describe the physiological challenges and medical consequences of deep sea diving in humans and how technological methods are used to compensate for a lack of physiological adaptations;

This module will cover a range of physiological systems and the way that they adapt to changing conditions both within and between animal species. Topics currently covered are physiological adaptations in circulation, respiration, feeding and metabolism, the skeletal system, and temperature regulation. The evolution of these systems across the animal kingdom will be related to differences in body plan, life style, and habitat. Moreover, regulatory mechanisms will be explored that allow individual animals to adapt their physiology to environmental changes such as those associated with diving, exposure to extreme temperatures, and birth.

Lectures, group-based library project with presentations and independent study.

Summative

This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.

Referral

This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.