Related papers: Thermodynamic Function of Life
Theoretical physics is the search for simple and universal mathematical descriptions of the natural world. In contrast, much of modern biology is an exploration of the complexity and diversity of life. For many, this contrast is prima facie…
From a purely operational standpoint, the existence of microbes that can grow under extreme conditions, or "extremophiles", leads to the question of how the molecules making up these microbes can maintain both their structure and function.…
The search for what differentiates inanimate matter from living things began in antiquity as a search for a "fundamental life force" embedded deep within living things - a special material unit owned only by life - later transforming to…
Entropy serves as a central observable in equilibrium thermodynamics. However, many biological and ecological systems operate far from thermal equilibrium. Here we show that entropy production can characterize the behavior of such…
The purpose of this study is to consider the near future of civilization in the framework of thermodynamics. Kardashev's proposal to evaluate the development of celestial civilizations by the amount of energy they are able to use was…
The emergence of the main divisions of today's life: (1) unicellular prokaryotes, (2) unicellular eukaryotes, (3) multicellular eukaryotes, and (4) metazoans, are examples of the--still unexplained--major transitions in evolution. Regarding…
Understanding the thermodynamics of the duplication process is a fundamental step towards a comprehensive physical theory of biological systems. However, the immense complexity of real cells obscures the fundamental tensions between energy…
The terrestrial water cycle links the soil and atmosphere moisture reservoirs through four fluxes: precipitation, evaporation, runoff and atmospheric moisture convergence. Each of these fluxes is essential for human and ecosystem…
It is well known that equilibrium in a thermodynamic system results from a competition or balance between lowering the energy and increasing the entropy, or at least the product of the temperature and entropy. This is remarkably similar to…
We review the thermal history of the Universe. We obtain a new estimate for the thermal history of the Earth over the past four billion years using a biological thermometer based on (1) a rough estimate of the absolute time calibration of…
The population dynamics and stability of ecosystems of interacting species is studied from the perspective of non-equilibrium thermodynamics by assuming that species, through their biotic and abiotic interactions, are units of entropy…
We provide a non-equilibrium thermodynamic description of the life-cycle of a droplet based, chemically feasible, system of protocells. By coupling the protocells metabolic kinetics with its thermodynamics, we demonstrate how the system can…
The ability of a planet to maintain surface water, key to life as we know it, depends on solar and planetary energy. As a star ages, it delivers more energy to a planet. As a planet ages it produces less internal heat, which leads to…
Research on the birth and evolution of life are reviewed with reference to the maximum entropy production principle (MEPP). It has been shown that this principle is essential for consistent understanding of the birth and evolution of life.…
The quest for life in the Universe is often affected by the free use of extrapolations of our phenomenological geocentric knowledge. We point out that the existence of a living organism, and a population of organisms, requires the existence…
The concept of entropy in nonequilibrium macroscopic systems is investigated in the light of an extended equation of motion for the density matrix obtained in a previous study. It is found that a time-dependent information entropy can be…
What makes living things special is how they manage matter, energy, and entropy. A general theory of organismal metabolism should therefore be quantified in these three currencies while capturing the unique way they flow between individuals…
Life relies on a sophisticated metabolic molecular machinery that turns over high-energy molecules to evolve complex macromolecules and assemblies. At the molecular origin of life, such machinery was absent, implying the need for simple yet…
The molecular biology revolution of the last seventy five years has transformed our view of living systems. Scientific explanations of biological phenomena are now synonymous with the identification of the genes, proteins, and signaling…
Living cells are energy- and information-processing systems that sustain a nonequilibrium steady state (NESS) by continuously consuming energy and dissipating heat, as required by the second law of thermodynamics. The rate of heat…