Statistical Physics of Self-Replication

TL;DR

This paper rigorously derives a lower bound on heat production during self-replication, linking thermodynamics with biological replication processes and implications for origins of life.

Contribution

It provides a quantitative, physical bound on heat generation in self-replication, connecting thermodynamics with biological and pre-biotic systems.

Findings

Lower bound on heat production depends on growth rate, entropy, and durability.

Implications for bacterial cell division and origin of self-replicating molecules.

Quantitative link between thermodynamics and biological self-replication.

Abstract

Self-replication is a capacity common to every species of living thing, and simple physical intuition dictates that such a process must invariably be fueled by the production of entropy. Here, we undertake to make this intuition rigorous and quantitative by deriving a lower bound for the amount of heat that is produced during a process of self-replication in a system coupled to a thermal bath. We find that the minimum value for the physically allowed rate of heat production is determined by the growth rate, internal entropy, and durability of the replicator, and we discuss the implications of this finding for bacterial cell division, as well as for the pre-biotic emergence of self-replicating nucleic acids.