2024-03-21 17:00:25
Scientists have discovered a new methodology to measure the production of entropy at the nanometer scale and in the area of red blood cells, blood cells.
The international research team has been made up of researchers from the University of Padua in Italy, the Georg August University of Göttingen in Germany, the University of Barcelona (UB), the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM) and the Francisco de Vitoria University, in Spain,
Researchers have measured the heat flow of individual red blood cells, known as the rate of entropy production.
Entropy is often associated with disorder and chaos, but in the world of biology it is related to energy efficiency and closely linked to metabolism, the set of chemical reactions that support life. “Characterizing the production of entropy in living systems is crucial to understanding the efficiency of energy conversion processes,” says Félix Ritort, principal investigator of the study and member of the Small Biosystems Lab of the Faculty of Physics and the Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology from the UB (IN2UB).
There is great interest in measuring entropy production in physical and biological systems relevant to climate change, in actively dissipative systems and in living cells. This advance has far-reaching implications for understanding metabolism and energy transduction in living systems. “Heat is a symptom of cellular health, and this finding could open a new way to determine tissue health,” concludes Ritort.
Researchers have measured the heat flow from active metabolic forces inside blood cells and the emerging flickering of the cell membrane. The methodology, based on measurements of fluctuations in particle motion, has been experimentally tested on optically trapped colloidal particles and applied to red blood cells. For red blood cells, the authors used experimental approaches based on optical manipulation, optical detection, and ultrafast live-imaging microscopy.
Dos glóbulos rojos. (Foto: Janice Haney Carr / CDC / Sickle Cell Foundation of Georgia / Jackie George / Beverly Sinclair)
Ivan di Terlizzi, from the University of Padua, and Marta Gironella, from the University of Barcelona, signed the study as first authors. Marc Baiesi of the University of Padua led the theoretical calculations. Three experimental teams carried out the experimental tests: the Small Biosystems Lab, directed at the UB by Félix Ritort; the group of Timo Betz, at the University of Göttingen, and the group led by Francisco Monroy, at the Complutense University of Madrid and the Hospital 12 de Octubre Health Research Institute, in collaboration with Diego Herráez-Aguilar, at the Francisco de Victory of Madrid.
The study is titled “Variance Sum Rule for Entropy Production.” And it has been published in the academic journal Science. (Source: University of Barcelona)
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