A field and circuit thermodynamics for integrative physiology. III. Keeping the books--a general experimental method

Abstract
Two space and time scales were discussed: that of single process fluctuations, and the larger scale at which near-equilibrium conditions prevail. Beyond that 2nd larger scale, irreversible thermodynaimc field processes were seen. The basis for these 2 scales of thermodynamic phenomena was explained thorugh a novel, nonanalytic formulation (in action space) that avoids the necessity to account for the detailed continuum mechanics in geometric space. The scheme permits accounting for the field processes directly from statistical moments of the fluctuations. The relations between mechanics and the statistical moments of fluctuations were introduced from the Einstein theory of Brownian motion. Action was quantized at every hierarchical level. Since there was an action-related time series succession of states at every observational level, all the required thermostatic and irreversible thermodynamic transport relations were obtained from such time series. This new approach offers an experimental strategy that in principle renders the thermodynamic relations computable from experimental preparations. The strategy was then applied to biological system,s which have communal organization, transport phenomena, conservations and spectra that are thermodynamic and functionally significant. A 6-step experimental appraoch was outlined. Examples of resh insights or solved problems arising from the approach to living systems through field thermodynamics were given.

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