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Fig. 3.1 The Belousov-Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction. The most intensely studied chemical
reaction-diffusion system (or dissipative structure) known. Reproduced from Prigogine (1980)
The theory of dissipative structures developed by Prigogine and his coworkers
(Prigogine 1977; Nicolis and Prigogine 1977; Prigogine 1980; Kondepudi and
Prigogine 1998; Kondepudi 2008) can be viewed as a thermodynamic generalization
of previously known phenomena of
self-organizing chemical reaction-diffusion
processes
discovered independently by B. Belousov in Russia (and by others)
working in the field of chemistry and by A. Turing in England working in mathe-
matics (Gribbins 2004, pp. 128-134). That certain chemical reactions, coupled with
appropriate diffusion characteristics of their reactants and products, can lead to
symmetry breakings in molecular distributions in space (e.g., the emergence of
concentration gradients from a homogeneous chemical reaction medium; see
Fig.
3.2
) was first demonstrated mathematically by A. Turing (1952; Gribbins
2004, pp. 125-140). Murray (1988) has shown that the Turing reaction-diffusing
