An energy budget is a balance sheet of energy income against expenditure. It is studied in the field of Energetics which deals with the study of energy transfer and transformation from one form to another. Calorie is the basic unit of measurement. An organism in a laboratory experiment is an open thermodynamic system, exchanging energy with its surroundings in three ways - heat, work and the potential energy of biochemical compounds.
Fishes, like all organisms, use ingested food resources (C=consumption) as building blocks in the synthesis of tissues (P=production) and as fuel in the metabolic process that power this synthesis and other physiological processes (R=respiratory loss). Some of the resources are lost as waste products (F=faecal loss, U=urinary loss). All these aspects of metabolism can be represented in energy units. The basic model of energy budget may be shown as:
P = C - R - U - F or
P = C - (R + U + F) or
C = P + R + U + F
All the aspects of metabolism can be represented in energy units (e.g. joules (J);1 food calorie = 4.2 kJ). Energy used for metabolism will be
R = C - (F + U + P)
Energy used in the maintenance will be
R + F + U = C - P
The compilation of energy budget for fish has a fairly short history, with the result that literature on the subject is limited.
Famous quotes containing the words energy and/or budget:
“After the planet becomes theirs, many millions of years will have to pass before a beetle particularly loved by God, at the end of its calculations will find written on a sheet of paper in letters of fire that energy is equal to the mass multiplied by the square of the velocity of light. The new kings of the world will live tranquilly for a long time, confining themselves to devouring each other and being parasites among each other on a cottage industry scale.”
—Primo Levi (1919–1987)
“A budget takes the fun out of money.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)