The acquisition and maintenance of order in biological systems has been a conundrum of curiosity for many thinkers, including Schrödinger who proposed a controversial quantity - "Negative Entropy" in an attempt to formalize and better understand the complexity and thermodynamics of living systems. Because there was perceived to be no precedent or need for such a quantity in physics, the result was a torrent of criticism.
My own work treats living systems as scale invariant (fractal) processes of catalysis. The Fractal Catalytic Model (FCM) states that the evolution of life is the evolution of catalysis. The principle agent of catalysis (at the scale of the enzyme upwards) being a type of highly robust and ADAPTIVE wave - a soliton (solutions to Schrödinger's equation may be solitons!!!) .
Also, and importantly, the FCM argues that biological development is intimately 'married' to the structure (and by inference - the adaptability) of solitons - thus -the action potential shapes the heart as the heart, in turn, structures the action potential. It is thought that this close union results from the DNA transcription regime of 'alternative splicing'.
What directly follows from this is that Schrödinger’s 'negative entropy' principle, if it exists, must be located in the mathematics/physics of the soliton.
The soliton 'chimes' with Schrödinger’s ideas about living systems in interesting ways:-
The soliton maintains its organisation as a consequence of the information relating to its boundary conditions (environment) that it embodies as part of its dynamic structure (Davia, 2006). This seems in-tune with Schrödinger's idea that living structures acquire and maintain their organisation by 'utilising' the structure in their environments.
Also, key to Schrödinger’s formalization of complex but stable living systems is the dynamic balance between entropy and negative entropy. The soliton is interesting in this respect also, because the robustness of the soliton itself results from the balance between two opposing tendencies.
Solitons are often described as occurring at the boundary between to opposing regimes - linear and non-linear. The linear component is essentially dissipative - whilst the non-linear component exhibits a 'compressive' tendency. When these two opposing tendencies cancel out you have a soliton.
At first blush it would seem that the linear/dissipative side of the equation might relate directly to entropy.
If the non-linear component of the equation is coupled to the structure in the boundary conditions (environment) then the possibility exists that the non-linear side of the equation might relate, at some level, to Schrödinger’s "Negative Entropy".
Can this be right?
Davia C.J, ”Life, Catalysis and Excitable Media: A dynamic systems approach to metabolism and cognition”. In Tuszynski J (ed .) The Emerging Physics of Consciousness. Heidelberg , Germany : Springer-Verlag, (2006).
Longo G, Bailly F. Biological organization and negative entropy. J Biol Systems. 2009;17:63–96.
Schrödinger, E. (1979). What is Life & What is Mind , Cambridge University press, New York, Based on lectures delivered under the auspices of the Dublin Institute for advanced Studies at Trinity College Dublin, in February 1943.
Christopher:
Your question is very relevant, since it brings back a very important question dealing with Entropy and living systems. The clasical definition of thermodynamic entropy, stated by Rudolf Clausius and later by Ludwig Boltzmann was constructed for stochastic systems. Hence the idea is that for a stochastic system the most stable macro (equilibrium) state is the one that has the largest amount of microstates. Since this idea is related to the quantity of movement, then the amount of temperature and preasure will affect the particular moovement, there fore, the posible microstates and hence the most viable macrostates.
So clasic thermodynamic entropy is valid and only valid for stochastic systems. When we move to living systems we are at the other side of the spectrum. Living systems are not stochastic, they are informed systems with some very deterministic elements. Information and the higher order of information: communication, adaptation, storage-retrieval, learning, knowledge, etc. Are escential to living systems.
In "A Mathematical Theory of Communication" Claude. E. SHANNON, introduces the concept of information as a mathematical equivalent to Entropy. Hence, Entropy and Information should be considered as physicaly equivalent, and there fore, mathematicaly computable. In that sense, the equilibrium state of a system will depend in the information to entropy (noise) ratio. Information will reduce the number of posible microstates and as a system is more informed, the number of microstates will tend to one (determinism).
This implies that we have to rethink entropy and more than that, we have to rethink thermodinamics when dealing with informed systems. Systems that will self-regulate to minimize Entropy. To that sense a living system is a system that exchanges, matter, energy and information, in order to self regulate and self organize. As living systems evolve, the amount of information in the system increases and the information to entropy ratio increases. All the way up to homeotherm organisms, that regulate the internal preasure and temperature, to maintain a basal entropy (noise) level. And social organisms that modify their environment to suit their needs, again reducing the amount of posible macrostates.
We need to redefine the thermodinamics of living systems and forget about the idea that we need to mess up the rest of the universe, in order to reduce local entropy. Local entropy reduction is the consequence of local information increase. All the way up to the fact that we can exchange ideas, through a common communication code, employing a reduce number of symbols in a electronic organiced media, througout a global network.
Best,
Ricardo
Entropy: A concept that is not a physical quantity
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/230554936_Entropy_A_concept_that_is_not_a_physical_quantity
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Physical Sciences
- Thermodynamics