Real-time measurement of entropy production and export in humans: A step toward entropically informed medicine.

ABSTRACT: Biological organisms are open thermodynamic systems in which internal structure and function arise from a network of heat- and entropy-producing processes, requiring external export of heat and entropy to the environment. System stability, including health and healing, is hypothesized to relate to the mass-normalized rate of entropy production and export, and the capacity to augment both when required. Using a novel methodological framework that allows the continuous measurement of heat fluxes and body temperature, we can estimate internal entropy production and external entropy export in humans during exercise under heat stress. We report the impairment of entropy export leading to entropy accumulation in association with increasing age, reduced fitness, and the presence of diabetes. In a

SUBMITTER: Brodeur N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12412715 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature