Prigogine Investigation Essay Example for Free

Prigogine Investigation EssayThe origination and maturation of active organisms is considered by many scientists, delinquent to general laws of nature, especially the second law of thermodynamics. In this piece this idea is explored, taking in account the dissipative structures and Prigogines thermodynamics. Introduction The use of thermodynamics in biology has a long history rich in confusion (Morowitz, 92) (Klyce, Brigg, http//www. panspermia. org/seconlaw. htm) The second law of thermodynamics was discovered by Clausius, who coined the bourne Entropy, which is usually defined as the degree of disorder. In the most general sense, Evolution of life means, emergence in ordered combinations from cells, to tissues and organs, to plants and animals, families, communities, and ecosystem. It can be seen that these two terms evolution and data express all told contradictory concepts. According to second law, Entropy of a closed system can never decrease, i. e. dSV ? 0 (Gibbs, 1 928). But, in case of evolution, the living systems increasingly go on to complex state of more order, suggesting that entropy in this closed system has decreased.This is the paradox that has baffled both biologists and physicists alike. Hence, an initial theory which both physicists and biologists concur upon was life violates the second law of thermodynamics. Evolution of life and Entropy The contradiction can however be explained, by subscribing to one of the two very different schools of thought. Either we can accept that the order that is seen in the evolution and growth biological systems is entertained at the expense of thermodynamic order.That is to say, sustenance in the relieve oneself of external energy is always provided to the organism from external environment and entropy of this larger system is increasing. Hence, living beings attract negative entropy, in order to compensate for this increase in the entropy, which explains the order. This concept was formed by Sc hrodinger. There is another explanation, which was proposed by Prof. Ilya Prigogine. According to him, the living organisms bunk as dissipative structures, i. e. thermodynamically open systems operational in non-equilibrium environment.These have the capacity for self-organization in the face of environmental fluctuations. In other words, they maintain their structure by continuously dissipating energy. Such dissipative structures are permanently in states of non-equilibrium. Ds/dt 0 forth from steady state Ds/dt = 0 steady state (Prigogine, 1977) In this case, equilibrium is the state of level best entropy. A system that is not in equilibrium exhibits a variation of entropy, which is the sum of the variations of entropy due to the inherent source of entropy, plus the variation of entropy due to the interaction with the external world.The former is constructive, further the latter can be negative. Therefore, total entropy of the system can decrease. Life according to this th eory can then be summarized as An organism lives because it absorbs energy from the external world and processes it to generate an internal state of lower entropy. It can live as long as it can avoid go in the equilibrium state. According to the second law, only permanent processes contribute to entropy production.This means the domain of a function in an isolated system which can only increase in time. It follows that the positive time direction is associated with entropy (Prigogine, 1977). Now, biological evolution is hierarchical and can be considered as an irreversible process of the variation of life with respect to the evolutionary time scale. The Law of Temporal Hierarchies makes it possible to cite quasi-closed thermodynamic systems and subsystems within open biological systems (Gladyshev, 2003).This facilitates the study of individual development (ontogenesis) and evolution (phylogenesis) of these subsystems. For instance, it is seen that the specific Gibbs function for the formation of supramolecular structures of biological tissues, G tends towards its minimum in the course of both ontogenesis and phylogenesis. (Gladyshev, 2005) The above specimen implies that, the mean flow of matter is quasi-stationary and the nature of incoming matter to the system remains practically unchanged.In other words, the supramolecular phase (structure) of the organism evolves against the background of the incoming flow of chemical substances of practically constant composition. This rationale of the stability of chemical substances is a thermodynamic principle. Accordingly, the tendency of biological systems during evolution to generate relatively exceedingly stable structures of higher hierarchies leads to the selection of relatively less stable structures of lower hierarchies.This rejuvenates the lower hierarchical structures and causes most unbounded evolution of the biological world. (Gladyshev, 2005) Conclusion The findings of hierarchical thermodynamics, specifically supramolecular thermodynamics of quasi-closed systems, confirm the thermodynamic tendency of biological evolution. Additional experiments could refine this model and further verify that second law can be apply in its classical definition to explain the origin and evolution of lifeReferences1. Gladyshev, Georgi P. What is Life- A physical pharmacists viewpoint, 12th Dec. 2005 http//www.panspermia.org/seconlaw.htm