Energetics of the smallest: do bacteria breathe at the same rate as whales?

Abstract

Power laws describing the dependence of metabolic rate on body mass have been established for many taxa, but not for prokaryotes, despite the ecological dominance of the smallest living beings. Our analysis of 80 prokaryote species with cell volumes ranging more than 1 000 000-fold revealed no significant relationship between mass-specific metabolic rate q and cell mass. By absolute values, mean endogenous mass-specific metabolic rates of non-growing bacteria are similar to basal rates of eukaryote unicells, terrestrial arthropods and mammals. Maximum mass-specific metabolic rates displayed by growing bacteria are close to the record tissue-specific metabolic rates of insects, amphibia, birds and mammals. Minimum mass-specific metabolic rates of prokaryotes coincide with those of larger organisms in various energy-saving regimes: sit-and-wait strategists in arthropods, poikilotherms surviving anoxia, hibernating mammals. These observations suggest a size-independent value around which the mass-specific metabolic rates vary bounded by universal upper and lower limits in all body size intervals.

Effects of metabolic level on the body size scaling of metabolic rate in birds and mammals

“…This and other evidence provided by Glazier (2005), Makarieva et al (2005a), Niven & Scharlemann (2005), Reich et al (2006) and White et al (2006White et al ( , 2007 strongly support the MLB hypothesis, but is inconsistent with the 3/4-power law and models proposed to explain it. In fact, of the 37 b values in table 1 with calculated 95% confidence limits, 78% (29) are significantly different from 3/4.…”

“…First, several rigorous empirical analyses, involving body sizes spanning several orders of magnitude, have shown that b often deviates substantially from 3/4, varying significantly among different taxonomic groups of animals and plants (Glazier 2005;Reich et al 2006;White et al 2006White et al , 2007, and among different physiological states (Glazier 2005;Niven & Scharlemann 2005;White & Seymour 2005;Makarieva et al 2005aMakarieva et al , 2006b). Second, the models supporting the so-called 3/4-power law appear to have flawed assumptions and serious mathematical inconsistencies that have not yet been resolved, despite much debate (Dodds et al 2001;Kozlowski & Konarzewski 2004, 2005Brown et al 2005;Makarieva et al 2005bMakarieva et al , 2006aPainter 2005b,c;Banavar et al 2006;Chaui-Berlinck 2006, 2007Etienne et al 2006;Savage et al 2007).…”

Succession of cable bacteria and electric currents in marine sediment

“…Cell-specific respiration rates of the oxygen-reducing cable cells in the oxic zone with a maximum of 36 fmol O 2 per cell per day on day 10 were high compared with aerobic sulphide oxidizers (for example, Thiobacillus thiooxidans, 2.5 fmol O 2 per cell per day) or the most closely related sulphate reducers (Desulfobulbus propionicus, 9 fmol O 2 per cell per day (Makarieva et al, 2005). Less than 10% of the cable bacteria cells were situated in the oxic zone and therefore the average cell-specific electron turnover for the sulphide-oxidizing cells was at least 9 times lower than for the oxygen-reducing cells; that is, more comparable to the other sulphide oxidizers.…”

The natural selection of metabolism and mass selects lifeforms from viruses to multicellular animals

“…Patterns of mass‐specific metabolism within and across major taxa from prokaryotes to mammals have been studied by DeLong et al. (2010), Kiørboe and Hirst (2014), Makarieva, Gorshkov, and Bai‐Lian (2005), and Makarieva et al. (2008), with the overall pattern (Figure 4) resembling the theoretical expectation of ${\hat{\mathrm{\beta }}}_{\mathrm{normal\beta }}=1/2d$ (Figure 3, right, c).…”