Order and disorder in biophysical systems: a study of the correlation between structure and function of DNA

The concept of order and disorder as complementary in the quantum-mechanical sense is presented. Negative entropy is introduced as a measure of the order of the system under study--namely, the DNA chain--and temperature as a measure of its disorder. A Heisenberg-like uncertainty relationship for order and disorder phenomena is derived. The concept of quasi-equilibrium is introduced because living matter is peculiar in that under physiological conditions there is no equilibrium in the strict sense. A new approach for DNA activity is suggested in terms of local or general disorder of the chain.