Abstract
Stochastic Schrödinger equations that govern the dynamics of open quantum systems are given by the equations for signal processing. In particular, the Brownian motion that drives the wave function of the system does not represent noise, but provides purely the arrival of new information. Thus the wave function is guided by the optimal signal detection about the conditions of the environments under noisy observations. This behaviour is similar to biological systems that detect environmental cues, process this information, and adapt to them optimally by minimising uncertainties about the conditions of their environments. It is postulated that information-processing capability is a fundamental law of nature, and hence that models describing open quantum systems can equally be applied to biological systems to model their dynamics. For illustration, simple stochastic models are considered to capture heliotropic and gravitropic motions of plants. The advantage of such dynamical models is that they allow for the quantification of information processed by the plants. By considering the consequence of information erasure, it is argued that biological systems can process environmental signals relatively close to the Landauer limit of computation, and that loss of information must lie at the heart of ageing in biological systems.
Highlights
Stochastic Schrödinger equations that govern the dynamics of open quantum systems are given by the equations for signal processing
The dynamics of the system can be interpreted as the result of signal processing, for, as demonstrated below, the dynamical equation governing the wave function of the system is precisely the equation for the optimal signal detection
A quantum system in an open environment behaves as if it is a micro information processor, just like an aggregate of quantum particles forming biological systems. From this point of view it is natural to enquire whether the dynamical equation for the evolution of the wave function in an open environment can be used to describe behaviours of biological systems
Summary
Stochastic Schrödinger equations that govern the dynamics of open quantum systems are given by the equations for signal processing. Our purpose here is to characterise qualitatively the dynamical behaviours of plants that result from information processing by employing familiar models used in open quantum systems. This demonstrates how models of signal detection are universally applicable to capture behaviours of. We believe that this information erasure process, resulting in the increase of entropy, must lie at the heart of ageing, or arrow of time, in biological systems This point of view has been advocated in the p ast[18,19], though the introduction of concrete dynamical models for describing the behaviours of biological systems in response to the changes of their environmental conditions under the influence of noise has hitherto been missing. The fact that most plants produce little heat, in particular, supports our hypothesis that they are able to process information at a level significantly closer to the Landauer limit than mechanical devices at our disposal
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