Talk:Homeostasis

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Rated "top" as highschool/SAT biology content and important concept in an organism's survival in its environment. The biology section only talks about thermoregulation - should be expanded (e.g. with mention of osmoregulation). - tameeria 04:51, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Requesting picture !

Picture: The up, the down, the too far down I saw a graph of how stress affects the body, the body tries to compensate and bring it back to equilibrium, but if the stress remains it goes off the other end continually until it's effect is illness and then death. I'd really love to see that picture included in this article. I saw it in Health class, it's a central theme to the health system.Nastajus 02:03, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] how

how is body weight or oxygen tension controlled?

[edit] homeostatis

Is homeostasis identical to homeostatis? See http://www.hyperdictionary.com/medical/homeostatis (anon)

"homoeostasis" and "homoeostatic" are both words, and both can be spelled with "homeo-" or "homoeo-". "stasis" is a noun, while "static" is an adjective. I have never heard of "homeostatis", and suspect that there's a typo in that entry at hyperdictionary.com. —AlanBarrett 20:52, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

[edit] homeostasis

Mammals maintain a thermal homeostasis, but they do it only be expending considerable amounts of energy. Would you consider this a handicap?

--203.51.251.130 08:47, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)ella

[edit] Repeated Vandalism

This topic has been subject to repeated vandalism by 148.234.56.74. Please consider deleting any posting by this author. Thanks. --Alphachimp 00:37, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cogito umberto eco homo

The opening paragraph states that "the term was coined in 1932 by Walter Cannon from two Greek words (to remain the same)". I believe this would be better expressed as "from the Greek words homeo (to remain) and stasis (the same)", but I'm not an expert on Greek. As it stands, it reads like a bluff. -Ashley Pomeroy 11:21, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

It's the other way 'round, but other than that, I agee. I went ahead and made the change.Jmeppley 17:28, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Clarification

On this article, the terms 'infradian' and 'ultradian' are defined, but they seem counterintuitive.

Now it may be that the author's use of "period = x" is actually correct in much the same way that frequency and period in a physics sense are respective inverses. The trouble is, this lends confusion.

It's also quite possible that the author has made a mistake and has accidentally transposed the two terms. I'm not certain enough to make an edit, but anyone who is could refer to the link below and ascertain the exact definition.

http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/infradian

From MeSH at PubMed:
Periodicity: The tendency of a phenomenon to recur at regular intervals; in biological systems, the recurrence of certain activities (including hormonal, cellular, neural) may be annual, seasonal, monthly, daily, or more frequently (ultradian) [i.e., several times per day].
That is, e.g., 1 hr ~ ultradian; 1 day ~ circadian; 1 week ~ infradian.
Jclerman 17:07, 11 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] references

could whoever made the following claim in the article please provide refernces/examples?

Sustainable systems require combinations of both kinds of feedback. Generally with the recognition of divergence from the homeostatic condition positive feedbacks are called into play, whereas once the homeostatic condition is approached, negative feedback is used for "fine tuning" responses. This creates a situation of "metastability", in which homeostatic conditions are maintained within fixed limits, but once these limits are exceeded, the system can shift wildly to a wholly new (and possibly less desirable) situation of homeostasis. Such catastrophic shifts may occur with increasing nutrient load in clear rivers suddenly producing a homeostatic condition of high eutrophication and turbidity, for instance.

thanks, Duracell 20:43, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Enantiostasis

Anyone knowledgeable about this field, could you please help expand the article on Enantiostasis? I've been asked to create it, but I don't know much beyond the definition, so if any of you can help, I'd be very grateful. 99of9 05:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ecological homeostasis - opposition

I'm not sure if it's worth including, but there's some opposition to the credibility of existence of ecological homestasis. Michael Chrichton's novel State of Fear is a an example (claiming the idea of homeostasis to be scientifically disproved in the 90s, but surviving as an idea for majority of the population). --82.139.47.117 22:59, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] how

Q: how is body weight controlled?

A: (Amusing) In Alberta, in the spring, the body weight of eagles is maintained by flight requirements. They eat all the newly emerged groundhogs (Richardson Ground Squirrels) they can until they can't fly anymore but have to waddle, and don't eat again until they lose enough weight to get airborne and chow down some more.

Oxygen levels in blood - by detecting CO2 buildup if I remember correctly.

Most homeostasis is by internal mechanisms - we probably don't know enough about Leptin (released by fat cells) and Ghrelin to say precisely how that works yet. Ndaniels 17:38, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two possible definitions of "risk homeostasis"

Two apparent definitions of "risk homeostasis" - can someone clarify - (and applying that term to ecology)

Apparently one, maybe the original, was the idea that safety features actually result in riskier behavior and substantially more accidents. I believe this was asserted a generation ago, but in what I've read, this doesn't seem to be the present common usage of "risk homeostasis" - this previous assertion seems not to be true, at least not over the long run.

Nowadays I keep seeing "risk homeostasis" used to indicate the homeostatic maintenance of a given level of risk. This latter meaning is, I believe, very consistent with the original concept and continuing research - and pretty much unobjectionable whether you want to discuss balding tires, putting five-year-olds on horses for a parade (recent news story of a death in Texas) or CO2 buildup. On this reading, risk homeostasis isn't dramatically different than any other kind of biologically maintained homeostasis. Ndaniels 17:39, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] i dont know

i dont know what this conversation/argument has turned in to, but it is my belief that this is arguing weather we should combine 2 articles, i am a student that is searching for homeostasis info. and would probly find it easier if they stayed seproite, just my opinion so dont take it to seriously —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tri-edge of the azura flame (talk • contribs) 15:31, 9 March 2007 (UTC).

[edit] ok, never mind

i went to reactive homeostasis to see the article, i dont think its big enough to really be alone, so i NOW think it would be fine to merge, its soo small! so forget the last comment by me —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tri-edge of the azura flame (talk • contribs) 15:33, 9 March 2007 (UTC).