People fall in love with the science of chemistry in childhood, like a femme fatale. They fall in love either because of the beauty of the multi-colored transformations of matter or because of the spectacular explosion of homemade explosives. I want to tell a story about great chemists and their remarkable discovery. In this story, everything also begins with explosives, and ends with beauty that surprises the eye and mind.

So, in 1905, 12-year-old Muscovite Boris Belousov, along with his older brothers, went to prison for producing explosives. This explosive was used to stuff grenades used by militants and vigilantes in the rebel Presnya. In modern times, this chemistry workshop would be called preparation for terrorist attacks. The guys carried out unsafe (in every sense) experiments in the attic of a large house in which the Belousov family lived. The family was not poor. My father worked as a bank employee.

Four of the five Belousov brothers were involved in the case. The eldest, seventeen-year-old Alexander, who, in fact, “propagandaized” the brothers for revolutionary activities, managed to escape from the police. Sixteen-year-old Sergei showed heroism: during his arrest, he gave a false name. The comrade whom he thus shielded from arrest was more needed by the revolutionary cause than the boy who went through the prison camp for him and eventually died in Siberia. Minors Vladimir and Boris Belousov were also supposed to be sent to Siberia. But the gendarmes offered the mother of the young revolutionaries an easier choice: to emigrate. The family went to Switzerland.

In Soviet times, the legend that Boris Belousov, living in the Russian emigrant colony in Zurich, played chess with Lenin himself, would have been pronounced with aspiration. In our time of disrespect for leaders, other details emerge. B. Belousov recalled that Lenin played with passion and, wanting to win, did not disdain psychological pressure: he scolded the enemy at all costs. Well, how can one not recall the story of the famous grandmaster O. Bender!

You know, Lasker got to the point of vulgar things, it became impossible to play with him. He smokes his opponents with cigars. And he smokes cheap ones on purpose so that the smoke is more disgusting. The chess world is in trouble.

However, Boris Pavlovich Belousov (1893 - 1970) This is where he ended his revolutionary activities. He did not join the Bolshevik Party either before 1917 or after. And he entered the famous Zurich Polytechnic Institute, from which he graduated in 1914.

Classes at the Zurich Polytechnic were free, but you had to pay for your diploma. Due to a lack of money, Boris Belousov did not buy the diploma and in 1914 returned to Russia with a certificate of the courses he had taken.

When the First World War began, the young man was not accepted into the active army because of his incredible thinness. And he went to work in his specialty, in the chemical laboratory of the Goujon metallurgical plant in Moscow near the Rogozhskaya outpost. In Soviet times, this plant was renamed “Sickle and Hammer”, which is what it is still called today.

The chemical laboratory of the Goujon plant was under the patronage of the famous Russian chemist Vladimir Nikolaevich Ipatiev (1867 - 1952), whose breadth of interests and genius was compared with D.I. Mendeleev. But in Russia his name is almost unknown. Why? Yes, because in 1930, being abroad and learning about the beginning of the process of the Industrial Party, he considered it best not to return to his homeland. Quite reasonably, Ipatiev believed that the proletarian government had finally decided to deal with the “specialists.” In this showdown, he, a former tsarist general, even an academician, even called by Lenin “the head of our chemical industry,” had only one thing in sight: the highest measure of proletarian defense. V.N. Ipatiev left for Chicago, where he began teaching at a local university. He got involved in petrochemicals, and actually founded this industry in the United States.

Why was V.N. Ipatiev given the rank of lieutenant general in the tsarist army during the First World War? Because he served as chairman of the Chemical Committee under the Main Artillery Directorate and supervised the production of ammunition and chemical weapons. Hypatier involved a capable young man from the laboratory at the Goujon plant in this case. Since then, for many years, B.P. Belousov has been working on “closed” topics. His work on improving gas masks and creating gas analyzers is not known to the general public. And since 1933, he was a teacher at the Military Chemical Academy of the Red Army. Whether it’s a miracle or not, B. Belousov survived the hard years when diligent punitive “authorities” mowed down almost all the military from major and above. Moreover, in 1938 he retired with the rank of major general. After the Great Patriotic War, Belousov worked as the head of a laboratory at a secret medical institute, studying toxicology and finding means to combat radiation sickness.

It was here that Boris Pavlovich encountered the wonders of the Soviet bureaucracy. The HR department suddenly discovered that the head of the laboratory did not have a higher education diploma. They did not dare to fire Belousov, but transferred him to the position of senior laboratory assistant. Naturally, without relieving the head of the lab from his duties. However, the director of the institute was on the side of Boris Pavlovich. He wrote a report addressed to Stalin, and the leader imposed a resolution: while Belousov held the position of head, he should be paid as the head of the laboratory and a doctor of science.

The main discovery that brought him world fame was made by B.P. Belousov at the age of 58. This is a rare occurrence in science. Retirement is not far away, what discoveries are there?

By this time, so-called oscillatory reactions had been discovered in biochemistry. Schematically, these reactions look like this. At least two reactions occur simultaneously in one vessel. Moreover, the products of the first reaction are the starting reagents for the second. In turn, the products of the second reaction are the starting reagents for the first. What should happen? At the beginning, the speed of the first reaction will be high, but over time its progress will slow down as the concentration of the initial reagents decreases. At the same time, the speed of the second reaction will begin to increase - after all, the amount of its initial reagents, the products of the first reaction, has increased. As the second reaction progresses, its original reagents will be exhausted, the reaction will slow down, but now the first reaction will speed up again - because it has the original reagents again. And so on ad infinitum. The concentration of reagents will fluctuate all the time - either increase or decrease. That is why the reactions were called oscillatory.

Boris Pavlovich came up with the same oscillatory reaction, but occurring with inorganic substances. This reaction was easier to implement and easier to study. It looked simply magical, especially if the reaction was carried out in a thin layer of liquid, for example in a Petri dish. At the same time, waves of concentration changes run across the surface, forming bizarre, ever-changing patterns. A breathtakingly beautiful sight!

However, to the articles that in 1951, and then in 1955, Boris Pavlovich sent to reputable chemical journals, the reviewers gave one answer: “This cannot be, because this can never be!”

A younger and less battered person could probably object to the reviewer. Draw up an act stating that the phenomenon described in the article takes place. Finally, come to the editorial office with flasks and reagents to demonstrate everything to the unbelieving reviewers. But General Belousov considered it beneath his dignity to prove that he was not a camel. Although he continued to work on his discovery.

It is unknown how it would have ended if Professor S.E. Shnol had not found out about B.P. Belousov’s amazing discovery. Having found out, he began to look for the discoverer, which was not at all an easy task - after all, Belousov worked in a “closed” institute, and an attempt to publish in a publicly accessible scientific journal, as we saw, ended in failure. But, finally, S.E. Shnol found B.P. Belousov and received from him a piece of paper with a recipe: how to carry out the reaction.

Since B.P. Belousov refused to cooperate, telling S.E. Shnol an amazing phrase: “I can’t and don’t want to make new friends. My friends are dead or dead", the professor “pitted” an excellent physicist and mathematician on the problem of oscillatory reactions Anatoly Markovich Zhabotinsky (1938 - 2008). A.M. Zhabotinsky and his colleagues developed a mathematical model of the chemical processes occurring during the reaction of B.P. Belousov, physical instruments for recording these processes, and even used computers to process the results and calculate the kinetic coefficients of the reaction. Now it seems: “How could it be otherwise?” But in those years, computers were also called “electronic computers” and looked accordingly. Steel cabinets placed in a rather large room with air conditioning and raised floors, underneath which stretched kilometers of electrical cables. Information was entered from punched cards or from punched tapes, and output on long paper “sheets” of printouts. Truly intelligent steam engines! At the same time, the cars are for collective use. So using computers to simulate complex chemical reactions was also new.

In 1964, an article by A.M. Zhabotinsky was published, summing up the results of the research performed. The importance of this article was also that it consolidated the priority of Soviet science in the field of vibrational chemical reactions. Literally a year later, this topic became very fashionable and the number of articles on this topic began to number in the hundreds. The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction became world famous. In English it is called the BZ reaction.

In principle, the discovery of oscillatory reactions was quite worthy of a Nobel Prize. But, as they say, “the card lay differently.” A certain compensation can be considered that in 1980 several scientists - physicists and chemists - were awarded the Lenin Prize. Boris Pavlovich Belousov was awarded posthumously.

Useful links:

1. Wonderful

Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction

Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction

Change in color of the reaction mixture in the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction with ferroin

Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction- a class of chemical reactions occurring in an oscillatory mode, in which some reaction parameters (color, concentration of components, temperature, etc.) change periodically, forming a complex spatiotemporal structure of the reaction medium.

Currently, this name unites a whole class of related chemical systems, similar in mechanism, but differing in the catalysts used (Ce 3+, Mn 2+ and Fe 2+, Ru 2+ complexes), organic reducing agents (malonic acid, bromomalonic acid, citric acid, malic acid, etc.) and oxidizing agents (bromates, iodates, etc.). Under certain conditions, these systems can demonstrate very complex forms of behavior from regular periodic to chaotic oscillations and are an important object of study of the universal laws of nonlinear systems. In particular, it was in the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction that the first experimental strange attractor in chemical systems was observed and its theoretically predicted properties were experimentally verified.

The history of the discovery of the oscillatory reaction by B.P. Belousov, the experimental study of it and numerous analogues, the study of the mechanism, mathematical modeling, and historical significance are given in the collective monograph.

History of discovery

Some configurations arising during the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction in a thin layer in a Petri dish

Reaction mechanism

Jabotinsky proposed the first reaction mechanism and a simple mathematical model that was capable of demonstrating oscillatory behavior. Subsequently, the mechanism was expanded and refined, the experimentally observed dynamic modes, including chaotic ones, were theoretically calculated and their correspondence to experiment was shown. The complete list of elementary reaction stages is very complex and amounts to almost a hundred reactions with dozens of substances and intermediates. Until now, the detailed mechanism is unknown, especially the reaction rate constants.

Reaction opening value

The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction has become one of the most famous chemical reactions in science; many scientists and groups of various scientific disciplines and areas around the world are engaged in its research: mathematics, chemistry, physics, biology. Its numerous analogues have been discovered in various chemical systems (see, for example, the solid-phase analogue - self-propagating high-temperature synthesis). Thousands of articles and books have been published, many candidate and doctoral dissertations have been defended. The discovery of the reaction actually gave impetus to the development of such branches of modern science as synergetics, the theory of dynamic systems and deterministic chaos.

see also

Notes

Links

1. From the history of the discovery and study of self-oscillatory processes in chemical systems: on the 50th anniversary of the discovery of the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction
2. B. P. Belousov and his oscillatory reaction, magazine “Knowledge is power”
3. Belousov Jabotinsky and Briggs Rauscher reaction schemes, differential equations
4. V. A. Vavilin. Self-oscillations in liquid-phase chemical systems
5. A. A. Pechenkin. Worldview significance of oscillatory chemical reactions
6. Oscillations and traveling waves in chemical systems. Ed. R. Field and M. Burger. M., “Mir”, 1988 / Oscillations and traveling waves in chemical systems. Ed. by R.J.Field and M.Burger. 1985 by John Wiley and Sons, Inc. (Engl)/

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See what the “Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction” is in other dictionaries:

Belousov's reaction- Change in the color of the reaction mixture in the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction with ferroin. The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is a class of chemical reactions occurring in an oscillatory mode, in which some reaction parameters (color, concentration ... Wikipedia

Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction

Briggs-Rauscher reaction- (“iodine clock”) self-oscillatory chemical reaction. When hydrogen peroxide, iodic acid, manganese (II) sulfate, sulfuric and malonic acids and starch interact, an oscillatory reaction occurs with colorless golden blue transitions.... ... Wikipedia

Briggs-Rauscher reaction- (“iodine clock”) self-oscillatory chemical reaction. When hydrogen peroxide, iodic acid, manganese (II) sulfate, sulfuric and malonic acids and starch interact, an oscillatory reaction occurs with colorless golden blue transitions.... ... Wikipedia - Contents 1 Zhabotinsky Korzukhin model 2 Brusselator 3 Oregonator ... Wikipedia

Oscillatory reactions- Change in the color of the reaction mixture in the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction with ferroin. The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is a class of chemical reactions occurring in an oscillatory mode, in which some reaction parameters (color, concentration of components ... Wikipedia

Belousov, Boris Pavlovich- Boris Pavlovich Belousov Photo from 1930 Date of birth: February 7 (19), 1893 (1893 02 19) Place of birth: Moscow Date from ... Wikipedia

Boris Pavlovich Belousov (1893-1970) - military chemist. In 1951 he discovered the first vibrational chemical reaction, now known as the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction.

This is how the solution in which the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction occurs changes color.

If you pour the solution onto a flat surface, amazing waves will creep along it (this image was generated by a computer program for simulating the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction).

The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is so complex that scientists are still trying to establish the interaction of various reaction components and catalysts.

The stripes on the tiger's skin are caused by oscillatory biochemical reactions with diffusion close to the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, the existence of which was suggested by mathematician Alan Turing. Photo of John and Karen Hollingsworth.

Musicians and composers live in a world of melodies. They understand the soul of the violin and saxophone, cello and piano. Virtuoso musicians hear much more in the harmonious sounds of an orchestra than ordinary people.

But virtuosos are found not only among violinists and pianists. In Russia, for example, there lived a virtuoso chemist. He understood the mysterious and most interesting world of chemical reactions: he understood the soul of metals and acids, catalysts and enzymes. He knew how they treated each other, how they were at enmity and friendship, how they connected and separated. He understood their aspirations and abilities, beauty and temperament. This man's name was Boris Pavlovich Belousov. He had such a fate that no science fiction writer could have dreamed up.

At the age of 12, Boris became a revolutionary. Together with his older brothers, he made bombs for participants in the 1905 uprising. The Belousov brothers were arrested and sentenced to exile or emigration. The family was forced to emigrate. She settled in Switzerland. The Belousovs' Zurich apartment was visited by many prominent Russian revolutionaries, including Ulyanov-Lenin, with whom Boris played chess. At the University of Zurich, the young man took a full course in chemistry and met Albert Einstein. Belousov did not receive a diploma because he had to pay too much money for it. The family did not have such a sum.

Boris managed to return to Russia only in 1914. He began to work together with the famous chemist, Academician V.N. Ipatiev in the field of military chemistry. There are chemists who develop chemical warfare agents. The department where Boris worked dealt not with poisons, but with antidotes. The young scientist was among those who created gas masks and anti-radiation medicines. Who among you hasn’t had abrasions burned with “green” or brilliant green? So, industrial production of this drug was established in the late 1930s thanks to the research of the young scientist Belousov.

Boris Pavlovich taught chemistry for many years. First at the military chemical school, then at the Academy of Chemical Defense and even rose to the rank of major general. During World War II, Belousov worked as the head of a department at one of the scientific institutes.

After the war, difficult times came for the scientist. Bureaucrats came to him and demanded to show him a diploma of higher education. But professor and general Belousov at one time, as you know, was unable to redeem his well-deserved diploma from the University of Zurich. Bureaucrats said that without a diploma, a scientist cannot occupy positions above senior laboratory assistant.

Belousov switched to the salary of a senior laboratory assistant, while remaining the head of the department - there were no other scientists with such high qualifications at the institute, although there were plenty of chemists with diplomas. In the end, the institute’s management obtained Stalin’s written permission to return the scientist’s previous salary.

But Belousov didn’t care much about money - he was too busy with his chemical reactions. During a long-term search for drugs that can save a cell from radiation, the virtuoso chemist came across traces of terra incognita - the “unknown land” in the world of chemical reactions.

The fact is that many biological processes are cyclical: the heart beats rhythmically, the lungs breathe evenly. Even the stripes on the skin of a tiger and giraffe reflect periodic processes occurring under the skin. Hunters also noticed fluctuations in the populations of lynxes and hares: the animal population is becoming larger and smaller. Mathematicians have even written equations for these periodic changes in the number of predators and herbivores.

Biological processes that are periodic in nature are based on chemical transformations. But here’s what’s strange: not a single periodic or oscillatory reaction in chemistry was discovered until the middle of the twentieth century. The search for a periodic chemical reaction at that time seemed like a mockery of the laws of thermodynamics, because coal burns and iron rusts irreversibly. It seemed impossible to imagine a chemical reaction that periodically changes its direction.

But Belousov understood that in the world of chemical interactions there must be an unknown, unexplored area - the basis of cyclic processes in the cells of living organisms. Knowledge, experience and intuition told Belousov where to look for periodic reactions.

In 1937, German chemist Hans Krebs discovered the citric acid oxidation cycle. The discovery is important - it was not for nothing that Krebs received the Nobel Prize for it. The Krebs cycle is a key reaction underlying oxygen respiration, energy supply and cell growth.

Belousov pondered intensely: is it possible to obtain a simpler, ideally inorganic, analogue of the complex Krebs cycle? This would make it possible to simulate complex processes occurring in a living cell with a simple chemical reaction, which is easier to study and understand.

What happens if you treat citric acid with a solution of bertholite salt and add more cerium salts to the solution? But you need an oxidizing agent, and one that acts in the presence of a catalyst...

The virtuoso chemist thoroughly thought through the future reaction and compared the oxidation potential of Berthollet salt with the valence of iron and cerium ions. In the trivalent state, cerium ions are colorless, and in the tetravalent state they are yellow. This means that the change in valency can be observed with your own eyes. The breakdown of citric acid will be visible by the release of carbon dioxide.

Before the chemist began to merge the solutions together, he did a lot of calculations, comparisons and estimates. Acting blindly means wasting time. We need a well-thought-out hypothesis, which can then be tested in vitro.

Belousov went through many reaction options, conducted hundreds of experiments and finally found his “terra incognita”!

The route, or rather the recipe, is as follows. If you combine in one flask in the required proportions a solution of sulfuric acid, sodium bromate and bromide, citric acid, cerium sulfate and phenanthroline dye, then a miracle occurs. The solution begins to change color from blue to orange and back with an oscillation period from fractions of a second to tens of minutes. And in a flat dish, waves of different colors will creep across a shallow layer of solution. After several dozen vibrations, fresh solutions need to be added to support the chemical reaction - exactly the same way as a living organism needs to be nourished.

The periodic reaction discovered by Boris Pavlovich Belousov is, in a sense, a simple analogue of life - a nonequilibrium chemical pulsation, similar to a heartbeat.

Friends and collaborators flocked to Belousov’s laboratory, where the liquid chemical clock “ticked” or, if you like, the “chemical heart” beat.

Belousov sat down to write an article about his discovery. The chemist had many published works and patents, but he had not published in academic journals and was not familiar with the customs of the reviewers there. Alas, reviewers of scientific journals were not virtuosos. This informal title is rarely earned by anyone.

In 1951, Belousov’s article about the discovery of an amazing reaction was published in the journal of the USSR Academy of Sciences. And she quickly returned with a refusal to publish. The reviewer ended the article by categorically asserting that such a chemical reaction was impossible.

The usually taciturn Belousov noted bitterly that today's scientists have lost respect for facts. Apparently, the reviewer forgot about the statement of the famous naturalist, creator of the microscope, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek: “One should refrain from reasoning when experience speaks.”

Boris Pavlovich took up further research of the new reaction. For five years he carried out measurements and analyzes. At this time, science did not stand still. In 1952, English mathematician Alan Turing suggested that the combination of chemical reactions with diffusion processes could explain a whole class of biological phenomena, in particular the periodic stripes on the skin of a tiger. Russian physicist and chemist Ilya Romanovich Prigogine in 1955 came to the conclusion that chemical vibrations are possible in nonequilibrium thermodynamic systems, which include all biological systems.

Neither Turing nor Prigogine even suspected that the phenomenon they were discussing had already been discovered, it was just that an article on this topic had not been published.

Finally, Belousov submits a new version of his work to another scientific journal. The article is returned again with a refusal to publish! The reviewer suggested that the author reduce it to a couple of pages. Belousov could not stand such impudence - he threw the article into the trash and forever stopped communicating with academic journals.

Belousov's nephew, who had already become a chemistry student, suggested that his uncle bring the flask to the editorial office - let them see the chemical clock in action for themselves! General Belousov angrily refused: “Why am I a clown to them?”

Eight years have passed since the discovery of the oscillatory reaction, but still no one except Belousov’s employees and friends knew about it. True, rumors spread around Moscow about an unusual glass in which a colored “chemical heart” beats. A chemist from Moscow University, Simon Shnol, heard about this reaction, caught fire and began looking for its discoverer - but to no avail. Shnol even got into the habit, when speaking at scientific seminars, of asking the chemists present about the unknown author of the vibrational reaction.

In the fall of 1958, after another seminar, a student approached Shnol and said that this reaction was discovered by his great-uncle, Boris Pavlovich Belousov. Shnol took Belousov’s phone number from the student and called the chemist.

Boris Pavlovich was dry and refused the meeting, but dictated the recipe for the reaction. Simon Shnol was unable to fully maintain the recipe; he did not achieve bright colors, but he still got vibrations of a yellowish color and was delighted with them. Curious employees made a pilgrimage to Shnol's laboratory, and soon the news of the miraculous reaction spread throughout Moscow.

Shnol was concerned: any published work devoted to the cyclic reaction seemed unethical to him, because it was not possible to refer to the published work of the author of the discovery.

Simon Elyevich called Belousov again, persuaded him for a long time, and soon received a collection of works on radiation medicine, in which Boris Pavlovich published a brief description of the oscillatory reaction. The collection did not have any reviewers, but its compilers knew and deeply respected Belousov and published his short note with lightning speed.

A three-page note from 1959 became Belousov’s only printed work about the cyclic reaction he discovered. But this small pebble caused an avalanche. Shnol instructed his graduate student Anatoly Markovich Zhabotinsky to study in detail the vibrational chemical phenomenon. Soon dozens of people were participating in the study of this reaction. They published hundreds of articles and received candidate and doctoral degrees. Belousov did not participate in this activity. He was well over seventy, and continued to work at his institute. And then some bureaucrat finally got to the virtuoso chemist and sent him into retirement. Left without work, Boris Pavlovich soon died.

The famous chemical reaction he discovered, now named after Belousov-Zhabotinsky, turned out to be a turning point in the modern worldview, based on the concepts of self-organization, open systems, oscillatory reactions and structure-forming instabilities. I think this work deserved a Nobel Prize. But only ten years after the death of Boris Pavlovich Belousov, he was posthumously awarded the Lenin Prize.

And yet, the virtuoso chemist received something much more than a medal and a monetary award - the incomparable pleasure of a new discovery.

What is more important - discovering America or getting a reward for it? Perhaps someone will think about the answer, but not a person like Boris Pavlovich Belousov, a virtuoso chemist and the happy discoverer of a periodic reaction of amazing beauty and importance. Now it has entered the golden fund of science of the twentieth century.

Topic 2

MN-12: Marina Makarova, Yuri Likhachev, Ivan Korotkevich, Natalia Kutsan, Ekaterina Kostyuchenkova, Velor Ermovsky.

Give the concept

Give the concept

Entropy

Information

Basics of systems analysis

System, rules for allocating systems

Types of systems:

Homogeneous – heterogeneous

Open – closed

Equilibrium - nonequilibrium.

The second law of thermodynamics, its interpretation from the positions of thermodynamics, cosmology, philosophy.

Entropy as a measure of molecular disorder

Statistical nature of the second law of thermodynamics

The second law of thermodynamics as the principle of increasing disorder and destruction of structures

The main paradox of the evolutionary picture of the world: the pattern of evolution against the background of a general increase in entropy

Entropy of an open system: entropy production in the system, entropy flows in and out

Thermodynamics of life: extracting order from the environment

Thermodynamics of the Earth as an open system

Justify why living organisms are nonequilibrium open systems.

Give the concept

Nonlinearity

Bifurcation

Give the concept

Fluctuation

Self-organization

What are chaotic systems

Give the concept of an attractor

Examples of self-organization in the simplest systems: laser radiation, Benard cells, Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, spiral waves

Why is the phenomenon of self-organization possible only in open, nonequilibrium systems? The essence of self-organization. Identify the phases and construct a diagram of the process of development of open nonequilibrium systems with the emergence of a new order.

Why is the theory of self-organization applicable in different disciplines (physics, chemistry, biology, economics, politics, psychology.....)

Principles of organization of modern natural science.

1. Matter is a set of quantized fields, the quantum of which is elementary particles (Babanazarova O.V. Concepts of modern natural science. Part 1: textbook / Yaroslavl State University Yaroslavl, 2000)

Matter- this is everything weighty, everything that occupies space or everything earthly (stone, wood, air, etc.); the general abstract concept of materiality, corporeality, everything that is subject to feelings: the opposite of the spiritual (mental and moral) (Explanatory Dictionary of the Living Great Russian Language by Vladimir Dahl).

Matter- this is that imperishable, unchanging, constantly abiding thing that underlies the changing, sensually perceived physical phenomena (Small Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron).

Energy- (from the Greek energyeia - activity) - a measure of various types of movement and interaction in the forms: mechanical, thermal, electromagnetic, chemical, gravitational, nuclear (Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. - M.: Center, 2002. p. 76 ).

Energy- a scalar physical quantity, which is a unified measure of various forms of motion of matter and a measure of the transition of the motion of matter from one form to another (Dictionary of Natural Sciences. Glossary.ru).

Energy- a general quantitative measure of the movement and interaction of all types of matter (Great Soviet Encyclopedia).

2. Entropy- this is a measure of disorder, disorganization of the system (Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. - M.: Center, 2002. p. 75).

Information– (from Latin informatio – familiarization, explanation) is a measure of the organization of the system (Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. – M.: Center, 2002. p. 75).

3. System- a whole made up of parts; it is a collection of interconnected elements that form some kind of integral unity.

System allocation rules:

Set a goal;

Identify elements that are considered indivisible at a given level of analysis;

Identify connections between elements;

Understand the laws of composition by which elements interact and form integrity.

4. Types of systems:

I 1) Homogeneous– systems in which the same elements are present;

2) Heterogeneous - systems whose constituent elements are of different natures.

II 1) Open– systems that exchange energy, information, matter;

2) Closed– systems that do not receive energy from the outside.

III1 ) Equilibrium– systems that, when transitioning from one state to another, require an influx of energy; when making this transition, the system can maintain its state for quite a long time without an additional influx of energy, matter, or information;

2) Nonequilibrium– systems that require a constant influx of energy, matter, information to maintain their complexity, since part of the energy is constantly dissipated.

(Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. - M.: Center, 2002. pp. 72-83).

5. Natural processes are always directed towards the system achieving an equilibrium state (mechanical, thermal or any other). This phenomenon is reflected second law of thermodynamics, which is also of great importance for analyzing the operation of thermal power machines. In accordance with this law, for example, heat can spontaneously transfer only from a body with a higher temperature to a body with a lower temperature. To carry out the reverse process, some work must be expended. There are severalequivalentformulations of the second law of thermodynamics:

Clausius's postulate:“A process is impossible, the only result of which would be the transfer of heat from a colder body to a hotter one”(this process is called Clausius process).

Thomson's postulate:“A circular process is impossible, the only result of which would be the production of work by cooling the thermal reservoir”(this process is called Thomson process).

From the perspective of thermodynamics, this law can be interpreted as follows: 1) transfer of heat from a cold source to a hot one is impossible without the cost of work;

2) it is impossible to build a periodically operating machine that performs work and, accordingly, cools the thermal reservoir;

3) nature strives for a transition from less probable states to more probable ones.

In other words, the second law of thermodynamics prohibits the so-called perpetual motion machines of the second kind, showing that it is impossible to convert all the internal energy of a body into useful work.

From the perspective of cosmology, this law can be interpreted as follows:

If our Universe is an isolated (closed) system, then energy exchange with other systems is impossible. None of the scientists doubted that our world is an isolated system, but then, according to the second law of thermodynamics, all types of energy must eventually turn into heat, which will be evenly distributed throughout the system, that is, the Universe will come to a state of thermal equilibrium and all macroscopic the movements in it will stop. The so-called heat death of the universe. Many have tried to resolve this contradiction. In order to reconcile this conclusion with the infinite existence of the Universe, Boltzmann argued that, due to the statistical nature of the second law, it does not hold accurately. In some fairly large region of the Universe, a fluctuation occurred, and the entropy in it decreased. Although this phenomenon is extremely rare, due to the infinity of the Universe, we have an infinite amount of time to wait for it. As we will see in the conversation about the evolution of the Universe, negative gravitational energy was not taken into account in these considerations, since the expansion of the Universe was not yet known. Taking into account the negative energy of gravity, without violating the law of conservation of energy, leads to the fact that the positive part of the energy can increase, and the increase in entropy that necessarily occurs does not necessarily lead to the fading of processes in the Universe.

From a philosophical perspective, this law can be interpreted as follows:

Order can never, under any circumstances, emerge from chaos by itself. In other words, spontaneous complication of any system is impossible.

Kirillin V.A. Technical thermodynamics: Textbook for universities. - 4th ed., revised. - M.: Energoatomizdat, 1983.

6. The discrepancy between the transformation of heat into work and work into heat leads to a one-sided direction of real processes in nature, which reflects the physical meaning of the second law of thermodynamics in the law on the existence and increase in real processes of a certain function called entropy, determined as a measure of molecular disorder.

Entropy – it is a measure of the disorder of a system, a measure of the dissipation of energy, a form of expressing the amount of bound energy that a substance has.

According to the second law of thermodynamics, all real processes in the Universe must occur with increase in entropy. Entropy, as Boltzmann showed, characterizes the degree of disorder in a system: the greater it is, the greater the disorder.

The physical meaning of the increase in entropy comes down to the fact that the

from a certain set of particles isolated (with constant energy)

the system tends to move to a state with the least order

particle movements. This is the simplest state of the system, or

thermodynamic equilibrium in which the movement of particles is chaotic.

Maximum entropy means complete thermodynamic equilibrium, which

equivalent to chaos.

However, based on Prigogine's theory of change, entropy is not just

non-stop sliding of the system to a state devoid of any

there was no organization. Under certain conditions, entropy becomes

the progenitor of order.

(Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. – M.: Center, 2002. pp. 86-87;

Kirillin V.A. Technical thermodynamics: Textbook for universities. - 4th ed., revised. - M.: Energoatomizdat, 1983)

7 . The second law of thermodynamics is statistical in nature (has a statistical nature) that is

applicable only to systems containing a large number of particles. Really,

Let's consider an example: a gas located in one half of the vessel tends to be evenly distributed throughout its entire volume if the partition is removed. This happens because the first state is more ordered; it can be achieved in only two ways, when the gas is in either one or the other half of the vessel. The second state, when the gas is uniformly distributed throughout the entire volume, is the most random, since it can be achieved in a huge number of ways due to the mutual rearrangement of all gas molecules while maintaining their total energy. And if in our example the gas contained a dozen particles, then due to fluctuations they would sometimes collect in one half of the vessel or the other. However, with an increase in the number of particles, these states would occur less and less often, and with a number of particles of the order of 10 22 such an event would be simply incredible. Although in principle it can occur, since the probability of its occurrence, although infinitely small, is not exactly zero.

(

8. The second law of thermodynamics states that all real processes in the Universe must occur with increasing disorder and destruction of structures– with an increase in entropy.

A more precise formulation of the second law of thermodynamics then takes

view: During spontaneous processes in systems with constant energy, entropy always increases.

In a state of equilibrium it is maximum. Entropy, as Boltzmann showed, characterizes the degree of disorder in a system: the greater it is, the greater the disorder. It is now clear that equilibrium thermal energy is useless for doing work because it is the most disordered. It becomes clear why all natural processes in nature involve energy dissipation. Because it increases clutter.

(Kirillin V.A. Technical thermodynamics: Textbook for universities. - 4th ed., revised. - M.: Energoatomizdat, 1983)

9.Evolution- an objective change occurring over time, manifested as rigorous, continuous improvement, leading to an increase in the quality level and degree of organization of objects, and on the basis of this - their successful adaptation and effective functioning within certain conditions.

Evolution- this is a way for the living to resist entropy, growing chaos and disorder. It creates various innovations, but natural selection preserves only those that give organisms resistance to further changes, those that allow them to reproduce their copies over a long series of generations, practically without changing. Strange as it may seem, it turns out that evolution works against itself.

We are accustomed to the fact that evolution is the creation of something new, more complex and perfect. But in fact, evolution is the creation of not just something new, but something new that resists further change. The surprising thing is that, while resisting entropy, evolution is actually driven by this very entropy. Thus, organisms cannot escape mutations - failures in the mechanism of transmission of hereditary information from parents to descendants. Mutations ultimately lead to the death of organisms and the extinction of species. But what is surprising is that during this inherently destructive process (a particular manifestation of entropy), innovations are accidentally created, which, again, by chance may turn out to be resistant to further degradation. It is they who are preserved by selection. This is how the genetic code once arose (no wonder it is universal for all organisms!) and the mechanism for organisms to recreate their copies from environmental material, this is how a diploid set of chromosomes and sexual reproduction arose, this is how care for offspring and various other complex forms of animal behavior arose (and in after all, our culture). In short, this is how everything was formed that allows organisms to reproduce themselves in descendants without disappearing from the face of the Earth.

10 . In open systems there are three streams of entropy.

The first flow is its own entropy, which, as in closed systems, always grows.

The second flow is the exported entropy (outgoing flow) removed from the system to the external environment. This flow is briefly called entropy export.

The third flow is imported entropy (incoming flow) entering the system from the external environment.

The resulting entropy of an open system depends on the relationship between these three flows and can behave in any way: increase, decrease, or be constant. If entropy is constant, then the system is said to be in stationary mode.

(A.P. Sadokhin Concepts of modern natural science. M., 2005)

11 . For terrestrial organisms, general energy exchange can be simplified as the formation of complex carbohydrate molecules from CO2 and H2O in photosynthesis, followed by the degradation of photosynthesis products in respiration processes. It is this energy exchange that ensures the existence and development of individual organisms - links in the energy cycle. So is life on Earth in general. From this point of view, the decrease in the entropy of living systems in the process of their life activity is ultimately due to the absorption of light quanta by photosynthetic organisms, which, however, is more than compensated by the formation of positive entropy in the depths of the Sun. In other words, living organisms extract orderliness from the environment.

This principle also applies to individual organisms, for which the supply of nutrients from the outside, carrying an influx of “negative” entropy, is always associated with the production of positive entropy during their formation in other parts of the external environment, so that the total change in entropy in the system organism + external environment is always positive .

Under constant external conditions in a partially equilibrium open system in a stationary state close to thermodynamic equilibrium, the rate of entropy increase due to internal irreversible processes reaches a non-zero constant minimum positive value.

diS/dt => Amin > 0

This principle of minimum entropy gain, or Prigogine's theorem, is a quantitative criterion for determining the general direction of spontaneous changes in an open system near equilibrium.

This condition can be represented differently:

d/dt (diS/dt)< 0

This inequality indicates the stability of the stationary state. Indeed, if a system is in a stationary state, then it cannot spontaneously exit it due to internal irreversible changes. When deviating from a stationary state, internal processes must occur in the system, returning it to a stationary state, which corresponds to Le Chatelier’s principle - the stability of equilibrium states. In other words, any deviation from the steady state will cause an increase in the rate of entropy production.

In general, a decrease in the entropy of living systems occurs due to free energy released during the breakdown of nutrients absorbed from the outside or due to the energy of the sun. At the same time, this leads to an increase in their free energy. Thus, the flow of negative entropy is necessary to compensate for internal destructive processes and loss of free energy due to spontaneous metabolic reactions. In essence, we are talking about the circulation and transformation of free energy, due to which the functioning of living systems is supported.

12. The thermodynamics of the Earth as an open system arises under the influence of two factors:

Under the influence of the external environment

Change within the system itself

Knowing these factors, we can calculate the rate of change of entropy

dS/dt = d e S/dt + d i S/dt.

The resulting expression means that the rate of change in the entropy of the system dS/dt is equal to the rate of entropy exchange between the system and the environment plus the rate of entropy generation within the system.

The term d e S/dt , which takes into account the processes of energy exchange with the environment, can be both positive and negative, so that when d i S > 0, the total entropy of the system can either increase or decrease.

Negative value d e S/dt< 0 соответствует тому, что отток положительной энтропии от системы во внешнюю среду превышает приток положительной энтропии извне, так что в результате общая величина баланса обмена энтропией между системой и средой является отрицательной. Очевидно, что скорость изменения общей энтропии системы может быть отрицательной при условии:

dS/dt< 0 if d e S/dt < 0 and |d e S/dt| >d i S/dt.

Thus, the entropy of an open system decreases due to the fact that conjugate processes occur in other parts of the external environment with the formation of positive entropy.

(S.H. Karpenkov Concepts of modern natural science.-M.: 2002)

13. Open systems are characterized by the exchange of matter and energy with the environment, including with other systems, while for closed systems such exchange is excluded. Closed systems practically do not exist in reality; this is a certain idealization technique for solving research problems. A non-equilibrium system is characterized by the need for a constant supply of energy to achieve a new state, since energy is constantly dissipated; this situation is far from equilibrium. A plant, animal or person is an amazing example of a heterogeneous, open, nonequilibrium chemical system. In an unstable balance. They are an extremely low-probability structure with very low entropy. This instability is especially pronounced when death occurs.

(Babanazarova O.V. Concepts of modern natural science. Part 1: textbook / Yaroslavl State University Yaroslavl, 2000. c 19-20).

14. Nonlinearity– differential equations that describe phenomena have several solutions (Babanazarova O.V. Concepts of modern natural science. Part 1: textbook / Yaroslavl State University Yaroslavl, 2000. p. 43).

Bifurcation– branching, bifurcation in the trajectory of the system at a certain point (Grushevitskaya T.G., Sadokhin A.P. Concepts of modern natural science: textbook - M.: higher school, 1998. p. 366)

Bifurcation– (from Latin Bifurcus - bifurcated) - the acquisition of a new quality by the movements of a dynamic system with a small change in its parameters, the point of an abrupt change in the state of the system

(Babanazarova O.V. Concepts of modern natural science. Part 1: textbook / Yaroslavl State University Yaroslavl, 2000. p. 42)

15. Fluctuation– random deviation of the system from the equilibrium position (Grushevitskaya T.G., Sadokhin A.P. Concepts of modern natural science: textbook - M.: Higher School, 1998. p. 380)

Self-organization– a natural jump-like process that transfers a nonequilibrium system, which has reached a critical state in its development, into a new stable state with a higher level of complexity and order compared to the original one. (Grushevitskaya T.G., Sadokhin A.P. Concepts of modern natural science: a textbook – M.: Higher School, 1998. p. 378)

16 .Chaotic systems- these are systems that are hypersensitive to the weakest fluctuations; these are unpredictable systems.

17 .Attractor– close to the concept of goal. A relatively stable state of the system, which seems to attract the entire set of trajectories of the system’s movement. If a system falls into an attractor cone, then it inevitably evolves to this relatively stable state

(Babanazarova O.V. Concepts of modern natural science. Part 1: textbook / Yaroslavl State University Yaroslavl, 2000. p. 25).

18. Examples of self-organization in the simplest systems: laser radiation, Benard cells, Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, spiral waves.

The generation of laser radiation is considered example of temporaryself-organization A continuous laser is a highly nonequilibrium open system formed by excited particles (atoms, molecules) and electromagnetic modes. fields in the resonator. The disequilibrium of this system is maintained by a continuous influx of energy from the outside. incoherent source (pumped). At low pump intensities, the radiation of the system consists of wave trains that are not phased with each other. With increasing pump intensity up to a certain threshold value, the radiation of the system becomes coherent, i.e. represents a continuous wave train, in which the phases of the waves are strictly correlated macroscopically. distances from the emitter. This transition to the generation of coherent oscillations can be interpreted as self-organization

H. Benard cells. A classic example of the emergence of a structure is the Bénard convective cell. If you pour mineral oil into a frying pan with a smooth bottom, add small aluminum filings for clarity and start heating, we will get a fairly clear model of a self-organizing open system. With a small temperature difference, heat transfer from the lower layer of oil to the upper occurs only due to thermal conductivity, and the oil is a typical open chaotic system. But at a certain critical temperature difference between the lower and upper layers of oil, ordered structures appear in it in the form of hexagonal prisms (convective cells), as shown in Figure 1.

Picture 1.

In the center of the cell, the oil rises up, and at the edges it falls down. In the upper layer of a hexagonal prism it moves from the center of the prism to its edges, in the lower layer - from the edges to the center. It is important to note that for the stability of fluid flows, heating adjustment is necessary, and this occurs self-consistently. A structure emerges that supports the maximum speed of heat flows. Since the system exchanges only heat with the environment and in a stationary state (at T1) it receives as much heat as it gives off (at T2< Т1), то

S=(Q/T1)-(Q/T2)< 0, т.е. внутренняя структура (или самоорганизация) поддерживается за счет поглощения отрицательной энтропии, или негэнтропии из окружающей среды. Подобные конвективные ячейки образуются в атмосфере, если отсутствует горизонтальный перепад давления.

Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction. Chemical clock. Self-organization in chemical systems is associated with the entry of new substances from outside, which ensure the continuation of the reaction, and the release of waste substances into the environment.

Figure 2

Such reactions were obtained in the 50s of the 20th century by Soviet scientists B. Belousov and A. Zhabotinsky. However, the results they obtained were so unusual that scientists could not publish them for a long time. Only in the 80s did they gain recognition. The essence of the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is the oxidation of an organic acid with potassium bromide. By adding an indicator of redox reactions (ferroin), you can monitor the progress of the reaction by periodically changing the color of the solution. Externally, self-organization is manifested by the appearance of concentric waves in a liquid medium or by a periodic change in the color of the solution from blue to red and vice versa (Figure 2). This oscillatory process occurs without any external intervention over several tens of minutes and is called a “chemical clock.”

It should be noted that the oscillations occur around an unstable stationary state far from equilibrium states. (Near stable stationary states such periodic oscillations are impossible.)

Spiral waves. In synergetics (the theory of dissipative systems), the most fundamental factor is the self-organization of spiral autowave structures in active media with energy dissipation. Spiral waves represent the main type of elementary self-sustaining structures in homogeneous excitable media. Such a medium is precisely the physical vacuum. Therefore, the elementary particles of matter inevitably had to self-organize in it and, precisely, only in the form of spiral autowaves. This is also indicated by the basic laws common to elementary particles and spiral waves:

corpuscular-wave nature of elementary particles (they, like the nuclei of spiral waves, have spatial coordinates);

cooperative behavior of both particles and spiral waves;

the presence of inertia of motion (both in elementary particles and in spiral autowave structural elements);

the presence of annihilation upon collision (both in elementary particles and antiparticles, and in converging and diverging spiral waves);

the presence of uncertainty in the time and space of the fulfillment of the quantum of action (it is fundamentally impossible to determine the beginning and end of any spiral turn that carries the quantum of action and, therefore, to accurately determine the coordinates of the world points of the fulfillment of the action);

the possibility of interpreting the terminal local sinks of spiral waves as negative electrical elementary charges, and their primary local sources as positive elementary charges;

the electron has its own angular momentum, not associated with its rotation (the radial movement of the turns of a spiral wave is similar to the effect of the rotation of a rigid logarithmic spiral);

the presence of positive and negative spin values ​​in elementary particles (similar to right and left twisted spirals);

the formation of an orbital wave by an electron in an atom (similar to the formation of simple vortex rings by spiral waves);

the impossibility of the existence of both a lone quark and a lone twisted vortex ring;

the presence of asymptotic freedom, both in quarks and in twisted vortex rings meshed with each other (interaction forces arise only when an attempt is made to separate them);

a similarity of topological prohibitions that limit the number of permissible elementary particles and three-dimensional spiral structures;

a very short lifespan of both elementary particles and three-dimensional spiral structures, unable to self-organize into structures of a higher hierarchical level.

M. Eigen. Self-organization of matter and evolution of biological macromolecules. M. "Mir", 1973.

Dubnischeva T.Ya. Concepts of modern natural science. - Novosibirsk: UKEA, 1997.

19. Why is the phenomenon of self-organization possible only in open, nonequilibrium systems? The essence of self-organization. Identify the phases and construct a diagram of the process of development of open nonequilibrium systems with the emergence of a new order.

SELF-ORGANIZATION- spontaneous (not requiring external organizing influences) formation of ordered spatial or temporal structures in highly nonequilibrium open systems (physical, chemical, biological, etc.).

Continuous flows of energy or substances entering a system maintain it in a state far from equilibrium. Under such conditions, the system develops its own (internal) instabilities (areas of unstable behavior), the development of which is self-organization.

Self-organization represents the possibility of changing the state of the system, and influence can only be exerted on an open system, and only a non-equilibrium system is capable of change and development. Such systems are sensitive to the influences of internal system elements. Therefore, the phenomenon of self-organization is possible only in open, nonequilibrium systems.

Phases in the evolution of open nonequilibrium systems:

development according to linear laws (maintaining homeostasis, predictability, the ability to experience influences as random as a result of external and internal interactions. Consequently, disequilibrium increases. Connections between elements are broken. In this state, a transition to phase 2 is possible)

bifurcation point (bifurcation) The system behaves unpredictably, nonlinearly. At the bifurcation point, the system does not remember its past. A development path is chosen and a new structure is formed.

With self-organization, new structures arise, order increases, the free energy of the system increases, and entropy decreases.

(Nikolis G., Prigozhin I., Self-organization in nonequilibrium structures, trans. from English, M., 1979)

The “Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction” is named after two Russian scientists, the first of whom discovered it ( Boris Pavlovich Belous ov), and the second ( Anatoly Markovich Zhabotinsky) – described mathematically. In English-language sources you can find the following name: BZ-reaction.

Strictly speaking, analogues of this reaction were observed by chemists back in the 19th century...

This class of reactions occurs in an oscillatory mode, in which the reaction parameters: solution color, concentration of components, temperature, etc. change periodically, forming a complex spatiotemporal structure of the reaction medium. Due to the periodic change in the color of the solution, this reaction is sometimes called a "chemical clock".

Due to the novelty of the phenomenon, B.P. Belousov Scientific journals refused publication several times, and he first published his data only in 1958 in the little-known “Collection of Abstracts on Radiation Medicine.”

“An active medium based on a chemical reaction was created at our institute by A.M. Zhabotinsky and A.N. Zaikin in 1970 and is a thin layer of liquid where the Belousov oxidation reaction occurs (later this reaction was called the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction). The reaction has a cyclic (oscillatory) character. Unlike most known oxidative processes that occur before exhaustion of one of the substrates (oxidizing agent or reducing agent), during this reaction an inhibitor is released, inhibiting the reaction for some time after only a small fraction of the reactants has been exhausted. The composition of the reaction mixture is as follows (it was described by B.P. Belousov in the mid-50s): citric acid - 2.00 g, cerium sulfate - 0.16 g, potassium bromate - 0.20 g, sulfuric acid (1: 3) - 2.0 ml , water to a total volume of -10.0 ml. Cerium (a metal of variable valency) plays the role of a pendulum: it appeared either in oxidized or reduced form.”