Ts. D. TSVETKOV and G. PETROV
Scientific Institute of Cryobiology and Food Technology, BG - 1407 Sofia, Bulgaria
TSVETKOV, Ts. D. and G. PETROV, 2004. Non equilibrium thermodynamic and fields effects in the cellular cryobiology and anhydrobiology. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 10: 527-538
The features of the contemporary physical theories of the cryobiology (the study of the structure of life matter at very low temperatures), anhydrobiology (the study of the structure of life matter at low water contents), is in common. This is following from the contributions of the environmental freezing-drying and vacuum sublimation (Zwetkow, 1985; Tsvetkov et al., 1989), then one of the major causes of damage produced by the several effects at cellular level: (i) low temperature per se, (ii) direct effects of freezing and (iii) indirect effects of freezing, of the structure of the "matter" fields of the life cells and systems is freezing induced dehydration at very short distance scales, where various properties of the physical vacuum of the "force" fields with the additional boundary conditions with which the vacuum state must be conformed are of crucial importance.
The technical framework of such studies is quantum field theory. The basic theoretical entity - the quantum field - is in this case regarded as analogous to a quantum-mechanical system with infinitely many degrees of freedom of solid body and the life cells and systems. A system of interacting quantum fields is then analogous to a complicated system in solid state physics and physical biology it can exist in different energy states, namely the ground state and various excited states. The excited states of the field system are characterized by the presence of the excitation quanta, which are the particles (electrons, quarks, photons ...) of which our material world is composed. In the ground state of the field system there are no excitation quanta, and hence no particles, present; the vacuum is this ground state, conformed with the boundary conditions of the week interacted quantum field system. Consequently, different features of the physical conformed vacuum may be modeled by the ground states of various appropriate solid body or biological system. For example, the vibrational ground state of crystal and molecule of the cell models the electromagnetic vacuum, a semiconductor models the Dirac vacuum, and relativistic superconductor may model aspects of the vacuum as regard the strong and weak force. The properties and the structure of the physical conformed vacuum of the quantum field with the additional boundary conditions are involved by the discussions of the many phenomena as for example, spontaneous emission and the Lamb shift, the origin of the mass for the W and Z bosons and the confinement of the quarks, pair creation and the associated screening of the charge by the polarization and may be by the vitrification and the ultrastructure of the life cells from the point of view of the physical biology in the field of the cellular cryobiology and anhydrobiology. In this case the system material objects and the quantum field system can be considered as a system with thermodynamically behavior where the difference between the mechanical and thermal energy is available because the vacuum energy of the quantum field can be calculated from the vacuum fluctuations of the quantum field.
There are a hypothesis too that the Universe itself is the grossly inflated result of a physical vacuum fluctuation.
The fields interactions are following from the physical conformed vacuum fluctuations phenomenon of the field forces between the bodies and life cells and systems. To day many physicists and physicists-chemists, be busy within study of the elementary atomic-molecule processes, properties of the gases, liquids, solid, colloid system, cells, liquid crystals to some aspect have been adjoined with the phenomenon of the fields interactions by additional boundaries over the quantum field system, with the necessity with his theoretical and experimental studying. From the point of view of the physical biology we can take in the account the thermodynamics treatment of the quantum field effects following from the additional boundaries conditions with what the physical vacuum must be conformed.
The Casimir effect (Bordag et al., 1984; Barash, 1988) is one of the fundamental effects of Quantum Field Theory. It test the relevance of the zero point energy: two parallel, large conducting plates in a distance a change the vacuum energy of Quantum Electrodynamics in such a way, that a net attractive force between the plates results. Qualitatively, this situation does not change, if the system is at finite temperature or with other words has a thermodynamically behavior.
Thermodynamics and thermal physics deal with many quantities and phenomena that are literally vital to the structure, function, operation and heat of cells. These include temperature, energy, entropy, concentrations, molecular motion, electrochemistry, osmotic pressure, reaction rates, changes of phase molecular aggregation and long range interactions between the material objects and the quantum fields and their vacuum conformed with the same boundary conditions as the quantum field system. At the molecular level is considered (Mitter and Robaschik, 1990) the thermodynamics behavior quantum field with additional boundaries of the Casimir effect between the two parallel, perfectly conducting square plates (side L, distance d, L > d), embedded in a large cube (side L) with one of the plates at face an periodic boundary condition. It is considered contributions from the volume L2d between the plates resp. L2(L-d) outside have different temperature (outside T^, inside T). For the temperatures T^ < T, the external pressure is reduced in comparison with the standard situation (T^ = T). Therefore it is expected the existence of a certain distance d0, at which the Casimir attraction is compensated by the net radiation pressure. That is possibly to investigate this (mechanical) equilibrium point for this system or for hydrological equilibrium of the system membrane-solutions-water and its stability both for an isothermal and an adiabatic treatment of the interior region.