Julian Huxley, Uca pugnax and the allometric method

Abstract

The allometric method, which often is attributed to Julian Huxley, entails fitting a straight line to logarithmic transformations of the original bivariate data and then back-transforming the resulting equation to form a power function in the arithmetic scale. Development of the technique was strongly influenced by Huxley's own research on growth by the enlarged ?crusher' claw in male fiddler crabs (Uca pugnax). Huxley reported a discontinuity in the log-log plot of chela mass vs body mass, which he interpreted as an abrupt change in relative growth of the chela at about the time crabs attain sexual maturity. My analysis of Huxley's arithmetic data indicates, however, that the discontinuity was an artifact caused by logarithmic transformation and that dynamics of growth by the crusher claw do not change at any point during development. Arithmetic data are well described by a power function fitted by nonlinear regression but not by one estimated by back-transforming a line fitted to logarithms. This finding and others like it call into question the continued reliance on the allometric method in contemporary research. © 2012. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd.