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Biological thermodynamics (Thermodynamics of biological systems) is a science that explains the nature and general laws of thermodynamic processes occurring in living organisms as nonequilibrium thermodynamic systems that convert the energy of the Sun and food into other types of energy. The nonequilibrium thermodynamic state of living ...
Humans cannot survive prolonged exposure to a wet-bulb temperature above 35 °C (95 °F). Such a temperature used to be thought not to occur on Earth's surface but has been recorded in some parts of the Indus Valley and Persian Gulf. Occurrence of conditions too hot and humid for human life is expected to increase in the future due to global ...
Thermoregulation is the ability of an organism to keep its body temperature within certain boundaries, even when the surrounding temperature is very different. A thermoconforming organism, by contrast, simply adopts the surrounding temperature as its own body temperature, thus avoiding the need for internal thermoregulation.
The only mechanism the human body has to cool itself is by sweat evaporation. [5] Sweating occurs when the ambient air temperature is above 35 °C (95 °F) [dubious – discuss] and the body fails to return to the normal internal temperature. [18] The evaporation of the sweat helps cool the blood beneath the skin.
In thermodynamics, a spontaneous process is a process which occurs without any external input to the system. A more technical definition is the time-evolution of a system in which it releases free energy and it moves to a lower, more thermodynamically stable energy state (closer to thermodynamic equilibrium).
Thermal equilibrium occurs when a system's macroscopic thermal observables have ceased to change with time. For example, an ideal gas whose distribution function has stabilised to a specific Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution would be in thermal equilibrium. This outcome allows a single temperature and pressure to be attributed to the whole ...
Homeothermy, homothermy or homoiothermy [1] is thermoregulation that maintains a stable internal body temperature regardless of external influence. This internal body temperature is often, though not necessarily, higher than the immediate environment [ 2 ] (from Greek ὅμοιος homoios "similar" and θέρμη thermē "heat").
The body temperatures of many small birds (e.g. hummingbirds) and small mammals (e.g. tenrecs) fall dramatically during daily inactivity, such as nightly in diurnal animals or during the day in nocturnal animals, thus reducing the energy cost of maintaining body temperature. Less drastic intermittent reduction in body temperature also occurs in ...