Size matters: Growth, Innovation, Economies of Scale and the Pace of Life from Cells to Cities and Corporations; Is it Sustainable?
Speaker: Geoffrey West, Distinguished Professor, Santa Fe Institute, USA Date: Tuesday, 10 November 2009 Time: 3.30pm – 5.30pm Venue: SPMS-LT5, School of Physical & Mathematical Sciences (Level 3)
Abstract
Life is very likely the most complex phenomenon in the Universe, yet many of its most fundamental and complex phenomena scale with size in a surprisingly simple fashion. For example, metabolic rate scales approximately as the 3/4-power of mass over 27 orders of magnitude from complex molecules up to multicellular organisms; time-scales, such as lifespans and growth-rates, and sizes, such as genome lengths, RNA densities, and tree heights, scale with exponents which are typically simple multiples of 1/4. The universality and simplicity of these relationships suggest fundamental constraints underly much of the coarse-grained generic structure and organisation of living systems. These 1/4 power scaling laws follow from underlying principles embedded in the dynamical and geometrical structure of space-filling, fractal-like, hierarchical networks, presumed optimised by natural selection. Examples discussed will include vascular systems, growth, cancer, aging and mortality, sleep, cell size, genome lengths, and evolutionary rates. These ideas will be extended to social organisations: to what extent are cities and corporations an extension of biology? Are they "just" very large organisms? Analogous scaling laws reflecting underlying social network structure point to general principles of organization common to all cities, but, counter to biological systems, the pace of social life systematically increases with size. This has dramatic implications for growth, development and sustainability: innovation and wealth creation that fuel social systems, if left unchecked, lead to fatal singularities that potentially sow the seeds for their inevitable collapse.
Biography
Geoffrey West is a theoretical physicist whose primary interests have been in fundamental questions in physics, especially those concerning the elementary particles, their interactions and cosmological implications. West served as SFI President from July 2005 through July 2009. Prior to joining the Santa Fe Institute as a Distinguished Professor in 2003, he was the leader, and founder, of the high energy physics group at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he is one of only approximately ten Senior Fellows. His long-term fascination in general scaling phenomena evolved into a highly productive collaboration on the origin of universal scaling laws that pervade biology from the molecular genomic scale up through mitochondria and cells to whole organisms and ecosystems. This led to the development of realistic quantitative models for the structural and functional design of organisms based on underlying universal principles. This work, begun at the Institute, has received much attention in both the scientific and popular press.
Registration
Admission is free.
Please RSVP before 6 November 2009,
by emailing to Mr Ling Hua Loon: hualoon@ntu.edu.sg.