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Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions
Unlike the Carnot heat engine efficiency published in 1824, an isothermal efficiency derived from thermodynamics and information theory can be applied to biological systems. The original approach by Pierce and Cutler in 1959 to derive the isothermal efficiency equation came from Shannon’s channel ca...
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Public Library of Science
2023
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Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9831307/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36626367 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279758 |
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author | Schneider, Thomas D. |
author_facet | Schneider, Thomas D. |
author_sort | Schneider, Thomas D. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Unlike the Carnot heat engine efficiency published in 1824, an isothermal efficiency derived from thermodynamics and information theory can be applied to biological systems. The original approach by Pierce and Cutler in 1959 to derive the isothermal efficiency equation came from Shannon’s channel capacity of 1949 and from Felker’s 1952 determination of the minimum energy dissipation needed to gain a bit. In 1991 and 2010 Schneider showed how the isothermal efficiency equation can be applied to molecular machines and that this can be used to explain why several molecular machines are 70% efficient. Surprisingly, some macroscopic biological systems, such as whole ecosystems, are also 70% efficient but it is hard to see how this could be explained by a thermodynamic and molecular theory. The thesis of this paper is that the isothermal efficiency can be derived without using thermodynamics by starting from a set of independent Gaussian distributions. This novel derivation generalizes the isothermal efficiency equation for use at all levels of biology, from molecules to ecosystems. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9831307 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2023 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-98313072023-01-11 Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions Schneider, Thomas D. PLoS One Research Article Unlike the Carnot heat engine efficiency published in 1824, an isothermal efficiency derived from thermodynamics and information theory can be applied to biological systems. The original approach by Pierce and Cutler in 1959 to derive the isothermal efficiency equation came from Shannon’s channel capacity of 1949 and from Felker’s 1952 determination of the minimum energy dissipation needed to gain a bit. In 1991 and 2010 Schneider showed how the isothermal efficiency equation can be applied to molecular machines and that this can be used to explain why several molecular machines are 70% efficient. Surprisingly, some macroscopic biological systems, such as whole ecosystems, are also 70% efficient but it is hard to see how this could be explained by a thermodynamic and molecular theory. The thesis of this paper is that the isothermal efficiency can be derived without using thermodynamics by starting from a set of independent Gaussian distributions. This novel derivation generalizes the isothermal efficiency equation for use at all levels of biology, from molecules to ecosystems. Public Library of Science 2023-01-10 /pmc/articles/PMC9831307/ /pubmed/36626367 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279758 Text en https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/This is an open access article, free of all copyright, and may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. The work is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) public domain dedication. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Schneider, Thomas D. Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title | Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title_full | Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title_fullStr | Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title_full_unstemmed | Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title_short | Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions |
title_sort | generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using gaussian distributions |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9831307/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36626367 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0279758 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT schneiderthomasd generalizingtheisothermalefficiencybyusinggaussiandistributions |