Nonequilibrium thermodynamics of circadian oscillations: Interplay between energy dissipation, robustness, and coherence

Collective oscillations are ubiquitous in nature. They help living organisms time their biological functions like the cell cycle, circadian rhythm, etc. These biological oscillators are inherently stochastic and operate far from equilibrium. They dissipate energy and use various mechanisms that ensure their robustness with respect to perturbations. Previous work by various authors [A. Barato and U. Seifert Phys. Rev. E 95, 062409 (2017), C. del Junco and S. Vaikuntanathan, Phys. Rev. E 101, 012410 (2020)] has shown the significance of energy dissipation in generating coherent and stable oscillations. Here we take a minimal model that includes biophysical mechanisms like differential affinity and ultrasensitivity and look at their contribution towards dissipation and generating oscillations that are robust. A biological system like a cell working with a fixed energy budget needs to allocate its energy to different mechanisms in the oscillatory circuit. Our work aims to explore this question. As a specific example, we shall be studying a minimalist model of the KaiABC system.