Sensing temperature

Abstract

Temperature is an omnipresent physical variable reflecting the rotational, vibrational and translational motion of matter, what Richard Feynman called the "jiggling" of atoms. Temperature varies across space and time, and this variation has dramatic effects on the physiology of living cells. It changes the rate and nature of chemical reactions, and it alters the configuration of the atoms that make up nucleic acids, proteins, lipids and other biomolecules, significantly affecting their activity. While life may have started in a "warm little pond", as Charles Darwin mused, the organisms that surround us today have only made it this far by devising sophisticated systems for sensing and responding to variations in temperature, and by using these systems in ways that allow them to persist and thrive in the face of thermal fluctuation.