Description: Allometry, the study of the growth rate of an organism's parts in relation to the whole, has produced exciting results in research on animals. Here distinguished plant biologist Karl J. Niklas has written a book which applies allometry to the study of the evolution, morphology, physiology, and reproduction of plants. Niklas covers a broad spectrum of plant life, from unicellular algae to towering trees, including fossil as well as extant taxa. He examines the relation between organic size and variations in plant form, metabolism, reproduction, and evolution, and draws on the zoological literature to develop allometric techniques for the peculiar problems of plant height, the relation between body mass and body length, and size-correlated variations in rates of growth.

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