Abstract
THE thermodynamic functions ‘availability’ and ‘maximum work’, as they are usually defined1–3, are generally inapplicable to systems that interest the biologist and electrochemist for the reasons shown below. Here I propose the redefinition and generalisation of both functions, and explicitly define a thermodynamic property, the ‘mechanochemical availability’, that provides a measure of the maximum usable mechanochemical work that can be released in the interaction of a contractile system with a source or sink of chemical potential of constant intensive state.
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References
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SUSSMAN, M. Mechanochemical availability. Nature 256, 195–198 (1975). https://doi.org/10.1038/256195a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/256195a0
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