What Do The Fundamental Constants Of Physics Tell Us About Life?

In the 1970s, the renowned physicist Victor Weisskopf famously developed a research program to qualitatively explain properties of matter in terms of the fundamental constants of physics.

But there was one type of matter prominently missing from Weisskopf’s analysis: life. Here, we develop Weisskopf-style arguments demonstrating how the fundamental constants of physics can be used to understand the properties of living systems.

By combining biophysical arguments and dimensional analysis, we show that vital properties of chemical self-replicators, such as growth yield, minimum doubling time, and minimum power consumption in dormancy, can be quantitatively estimated using fundamental physical constants.

The calculations highlight how the laws of physics constrain chemistry-based life on Earth, and if it exists, elsewhere in our universe.

Pankaj Mehta, Jane Kondev

Comments: 15 pages, 2 Figures, SI
Subjects: Biological Physics (physics.bio-ph); Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP); Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
Cite as: arXiv:2509.09892 [physics.bio-ph] (or arXiv:2509.09892v1 [physics.bio-ph] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2509.09892
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Submission history
From: Pankaj Mehta
[v1] Thu, 11 Sep 2025 23:08:08 UTC (1,087 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.09892
Astrobiology,