Biological physics, or the physics of living systems, brings the physicist’s style of inquiry to bear on the beautiful phenomena of life. Physics of Life—the National Academies’ first decadal survey on biological physics—presents a compelling vision for the next decade of science across the enormous range of phenomena encountered in living systems. The report makes recommendations about education, funding, and building a more inclusive community.
Biological physicists search for new, physical explanations for biological processes at both the microscopic (e.g. the function of molecules and cells) and macroscopic (e.g. the movement of swarms and the dynamics of ecosystems) levels. They start by asking themselves,“What are the essential physical principles that enable the remarkable phenomena of life?”
Work in biological physics expands our ability to understand and explore the living world and has the potential to change our view of ourselves as humans. Research in the field directly contributes to the scientific understanding underpinning a range of applications such as vaccine development, drug design, and robotics. Moreover, many new developments in biological physics are deeply connected to progress in other fields, across physics, biology, and chemistry.
Biological physics has seen rapid growth as a field in recent years. Over the past two decades, the number of PhD theses in biological physics has roughly tripled, with current numbers comparable to other subfields in physics. This leads to a central conclusion of this report:
Biological physics now has emerged fully as a field of physics, alongside more traditional fields of astrophysics and cosmology, atomic, molecular and optical physics, condensed matter physics, nuclear physics, particle physics, and plasma physics.
Organisms have to accomplish various tasks—for example, how to sense the environment, or how to move toward sources of food—and carrying out these tasks requires them to solve physical problems. Developing precise physical explanations for how organisms achieve these tasks is one of the central problems in biological physics.
Examples include:
Learn more in Chapter 1 of the report
Organisms and even individual cells need information about what is happening in their environment, and they need information about their own internal states. Understanding the physics of living systems requires us to understand how information flows across many scales, from single molecules to groups of organisms. The search for the physical basis of information transmission in living systems has led to foundational discoveries, pointing to new physics problems.
Examples include:
Learn more in Chapter 2 of the report
Complex interactions at the cellular or molecular level can lead to unexpected results at much larger scales. How these “emergent” phenomena occur in livings system, how emergent phenomena of life are different from inanimate systems, and how to describe these phenomena through statistical mechanics are key areas of interest in biological physics.
Examples include:
Learn more in Chapter 3 of the report
Making quantitative predictions about the behavior of a living system requires knowing many numerical facts, such as how many kinds of each relevant molecule are inside a cell and how strongly these molecules interact with one another. Understanding how organisms adapt, learn, and evolve around these parameters is important for many different problems in biological physics.
Examples include:
Learn more in Chapter 4 of the report
Supporting future biological physicists at the undergraduate and graduate level is essential for the health of the field. Even at well-resourced institutions, physics students can emerge with a degree and not even know that biological physics exists as a field. Therefore, the report makes the following recommendations for physics departments, universities, and funding agencies:
To learn more and for a complete listing of the report’s recommendations related to education, check out Chapter 8 of the report.
Research in biological physics is supported by multiple agencies and foundations, but this support is fragmented, obscuring the breadth and coherence of the field. The Physics of Living Systems program in the Physics Division of the National Science Foundation (NSF) is the only federal program that aims to match the breadth of work in the field. However, funding levels are dangerously close to the minimum needed for the health of the field. To support the field of biological physics, the report makes the following recommendations for funding agencies:
To learn more and for a complete listing of the report’s recommendations related to funding, collaboration, and coordination, check out Chapter 9 of the report.
Improving attitudes and policies toward immigration, race, and gender is critical for addressing broader issues of justice and equity in the stewardship of resources for biological physics.
Science in the United States has long benefited from the influx of talented students and scientists from elsewhere in the world. However, discussions of U.S. policy toward international students and scientists are being driven by concerns about national and economic security. Since 2016, applications to U.S. physics graduate programs from international students have decreased. To support international students, the report recommends:
Inequalities of opportunity have an especially large impact on physics education. The field of biological physics should aim to welcome, support, and nurture talented young people from around the world and from U.S. citizens of all ethnic groups. In particular, the report recommends:
To learn more and for a complete listing of the report’s recommendations related to building an inclusive community, check out Chapter 10 of the report.
Physics of Life