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Quantum Coherence and the Understanding of Life

  • Chapter
Biophotons

Abstract

An event 30 years ago this month (June) marked the dawn of a new era in Biology — an era which offers quite novel possibilities, not only for the understanding of the orderly functioning of metabolically active biosystems and their near-quantum sensitivities, but also, more recently, for an integration of consciousness into Physical Science. The event was the first international conference devoted to Theoretical Physics and Biology, and took place at Versailles under the auspices of l’Institut de la Vie. The conference was the brainchild of the institute’s director, Maurice Marois, and the internationally renowned theoretical physicist, Herbert Fröhlich; it arose in response to a somewhat provocative assertion [1] from some quarters — and espoused by Wigner [2] — that living systems (and particularly their self-reproducibility) could not be understood in terms of the laws of contemporary physics, but required additional (so-called biotonic) laws1, yet to be discovered.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK

    G. J. Hyland

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  1. G. J. Hyland
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Jiin-Ju Chang

  2. International Institute of Biophysics, Hombroich, Germany

    Jiin-Ju Chang  & Fritz-Albert Popp  & 

  3. Institute of Optical Devices, Technical University Ilmenau, Germany

    Joachim Fisch

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© 1998 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Hyland, G.J. (1998). Quantum Coherence and the Understanding of Life. In: Chang, JJ., Fisch, J., Popp, FA. (eds) Biophotons. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0928-6_22

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0928-6_22

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-90-481-5033-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-017-0928-6

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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