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| Titel |
HESS Opinions "Biological catalysis of the hydrological cycle: life's thermodynamic function" |
| VerfasserIn |
K. Michaelian |
| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
Englisch
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| ISSN |
1027-5606
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| Digitales Dokument |
URL |
| Erschienen |
In: Hydrology and Earth System Sciences ; 16, no. 8 ; Nr. 16, no. 8 (2012-08-13), S.2629-2645 |
| Datensatznummer |
250013417
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| Publikation (Nr.) |
 copernicus.org/hess-16-2629-2012.pdf |
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| Zusammenfassung |
| Darwinian theory depicts life as being overwhelmingly consumed by a fight for
survival in a hostile environment. However, from a thermodynamic perspective,
life is a dynamic, out of equilibrium process, stabilizing and coevolving in
concert with its abiotic environment. The living components of the biosphere
on the Earth's surface of greatest biomass, the plants and
cyanobacteria, are involved in the transpiration of a vast amount of water.
Transpiration is part of the global water cycle, and it is this cycle that
distinguishes Earth from its apparently life-barren neighboring planets,
Venus and Mars. The dissipation of sunlight into heat by organic molecules in
the biosphere, and its coupling to the water cycle (as well as other abiotic
processes), is by far the greatest entropy-producing process occurring on
Earth. Life, from this perspective, can be viewed as performing an important
thermodynamic function, acting as a dynamic catalyst by aiding irreversible
abiotic processes such as the water cycle, hurricanes, and ocean and wind
currents to produce entropy. The role of animals in this view is that of
unwitting but dedicated servants of the plants and cyanobacteria, helping
them to grow, and to spread into initially inhospitable areas. |
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