Life: Energy - information relationship within material systems. I: General outline of the concept (Q807441)

Neither the statistical theory of information nor the thermodynamics of dissipative structures are able to explain the nature of the living system. The biological system, being a material system, may be characterized and experimentally verified by such general notions as mass, energy and information. A consideration of the relationship between energy and information within the living system is attempted. The energy and information are treated as coupled values in describing such a system. The notion of biofunction is understood as intrinsic flow and transformation of the information-energy coupled values. Understanding of the content of this flow and its transformations is a basis for a coherent meaning of energy, thermodynamic entropy, information and control within the living system. The mass, energy and information categories are not only descriptive means of the system, but also additive operative values on the microlevel of the physical phenomena proceeding within the living system.