Evidence map›Paper›PMID 36626367›Full record

ArticlePloS one2023

Generalizing the isothermal efficiency by using Gaussian distributions.

Thomas D Schneider

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in PloS one, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author.

Thomas D SchneiderNational Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, Center for Cancer Research, RNA Biology Laboratory, Frederick, MD, United States of America.ORCID 0000-0002-9841-1531

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

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.

Indexed as

EcosystemNormal DistributionThermodynamicsBiologyEcologyInformation Theory

Identifiers

PMID36626367
PMCPMC9831307

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.