The research proposed will focus on a mechanistic model for understanding simultaneous heat and water fluxes in porous media such as fur, feathers or grasses or crops in outdoor environments. Understanding heat and water fluxes is important because they are a critical part of an animal's capacity to grow and reproduce. Without a mechanistic understanding of these fluxes, empirical measurements must be made for each new situation. This work is important because it will lead to understanding animal population and community dynamics and to understanding the influences of multiple low level stresses, such as climate, disease and toxicants on those dynamics. It also provides a fundamental basis for developing general microclimate models for grasses and crops, which are "home" (constitute the microenvironments) for small vertebrates and invertebrates. Results from this research can also be applied to: 1) assessment of impact of climate change on animal growth and reproduction potential; 2) assessment of genetic engineering of changes in animal allometry of fur properties as it affects feed efficiency for production of milk or meat; 3) assessment of different, more energy efficient domestic animal housing in different climates; 4) understanding aspects of the limits to animal distributions and how they might change for different climate change scenarios; 5) assessment of the impact of infectious diseases and low level toxicants on capacity of animals to grow and reproduce in different environments.
