A biogenic principle within the constructal law: The flow of information in biological systems

Abstract

The Constructal Law states that ‘for a finite-size flow system to persist in time (to live) it must evolve such that it provides greater and greater access to the currents that flow through it.’ Arising from thermodynamics, this illuminating principle explains the properties and design features of many physical systems. It is now proposed that the definition of ‘currents that flow’ within the Constructal Law should be recognized to include the flow of information in living systems as a biogenic corollary. As the foundation of our biological system, cells seek to maximize their effective information about their external and internal environment. As their constructs, multicellular organisms reflect this requirement, accounting for living forms and their anatomic features. The cellular senome represents the crucial element of this flow, acting as the bioactive interface between environmental syntactic information and the internally-generated cellular semantic information upon which cellular actions depend. A Biogenic Principle as a corollary of the Constructal Law is presented, stating that for any finite-size living system to persist in time (to live), it must evolve to provide greater and greater access to the flow of information between itself and its environment, balanced against the constraining flow dynamics of natural physical systems. Within this biogenic principle, a Central Axiom of Biological Information can be identified: there is no unilateral flow of information in living systems.