A group of biologists from the United Kingdom and the United States have found that the ability to survive in living organisms is not determined by the complexity of the structure of their bodies. The research results are published in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.
Today, there are more than eight million species of living creatures on Earth, and all of them, in the course of evolution, have developed equally good survival abilities, both bacteria and elephants.
Moreover, all animals are mortal, because they accumulate molecular and cellular damage, and life continues only because they leave offspring. Research shows that living organisms and plants are now doing well in this task.
In a new study, scientists have compiled an equal fitness paradigm that includes measures of life expectancy and reproduction rate. According to the data obtained, animals and microbes, despite their different body sizes, habitats and evolutionary history, are equally well fighting for the existence of their species. This is due to the fact that each living creature in the process of reproduction transfers the same amount of energy to the offspring.
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According to scientists, this means that even the largest animals, an elephant or a blue whale, do not consume more energy per gram of their mass to continue their species than a small bacterium.
Also, the paradigm includes life expectancy and the rate of reproduction of offspring. So, small rodents reproduce quickly and do not live long, which means that the energy consumed will be small, and the elephant or whale lives longer, consumes more energy, but reproduces rarely and slowly. Therefore, all living species on Earth are in equal conditions.
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