关键词: 相关生长, 尺度转换, 尺度, 分形分配网络模型, 能量相当, 生物量分配

Abstract: Ecological research is often linked with ecological scales, and scaling up or scaling down for ecological attributes at different levels of biological organization are one of the most critical but difficult issues. Allometric relations, however, are perhaps able to act as qualified nutcrackers. Allometric scaling relations are characteristic of all organisms. Ecologists suggest that there are similar mechanisms behind the numerous quarter-power allometric relations, which reflect the growth rates of organisms constrained by the limits of available resources and transportation capacity through organismal bodies. They believe that many attributes in large ecological scales can emerge from a few allometric principles operating in the scale of individual, and so allometric scaling laws may be among the most potential solutions to ecological scaling. Here the authors give a review on allometric theory and its recent applications in multi-scales of plant ecology.

Key words: allometry, ecological-scaling, scale, fractal-like distribution networks model, energy equivalence, biomass partitioning