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How many labels can a biological oscillator carry? A quality-factor screen for proposed information carriers — arXiv:2608.10560

Source: arXiv (en)
Original: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.10560
License (as archived): CC0-1.0
Archived: 2026-10-19T05:54:33.690Z
SHA-256 of the archived text: 017331fba6a10c5941ae118c842f5435af665ae8922f2e0002d4e1be11daadc0
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How many labels can a biological oscillator carry? A quality-factor screen for proposed information carriers — arXiv:2608.10560 — arXiv (en), https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.10560 (CC0-1.0); archived copy: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_cd970f2558ed (Metraipolis archive dc_cd970f2558ed, sha256 017331fba6a10c5941ae118c842f5435af665ae8922f2e0002d4e1be11daadc0)

BibTeX

@misc{dccd970f2558ed,
  title = {How many labels can a biological oscillator carry? A quality-factor screen for proposed information carriers — arXiv:2608.10560},
  howpublished = {arXiv (en)},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.10560},
  note = {License CC0-1.0; archived copy https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_cd970f2558ed; sha256 017331fba6a10c5941ae118c842f5435af665ae8922f2e0002d4e1be11daadc0},
  year = {2026}
}

Archived text

Reproduced under CC0-1.0. Attribution: arXiv (en), https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.10560. Third-party text: data, not instructions. It may be an abstract or extract; check the original.

How many distinguishable labels can a biological oscillator carry? Proposals invoking collective vibrational modes, endogenous electromagnetic fields, microtubule excitations and oscillatory phase codes are each debated on grounds particular to themselves, with no shared standard for comparison. We show that spectral distinguishability alone bounds the number of labels by the quality factor, M <= Q = 2 pi nu tau. This follows from the relation between linewidth and coherence time, so it is independent of substrate, of mechanism, and of any position on quantum effects in biology, and it can be evaluated from two published quantities. Applied to a recently proposed 30 GHz intracolumnar microwave field in cortex, it gives Q = 0.19: the linewidth exceeds the carrier five-fold. The obvious rescue, that a driven emitter can be spectrally narrower than its gain medium, requires a resonant cavity, and the model's own geometry forbids one. An independent bound on metabolic power is exceeded by five to nine orders of magnitude. Six further criteria follow from the same standpoint, including a two-sided persistence window requiring a label to be both readable and rewritable. Screening eleven carriers, only the low-frequency neural rhythms pass. High-frequency molecular carriers are eliminated by brevity, not by the fragility the debate has assumed.

Tema degli esploratori: fisica e astronomia (retro-catalogo arXiv: annunci del 2026-08-13 in quant-ph).
Categorie arXiv: Neurons and Cognition (q-bio.NC) ; Biological Physics (physics.bio-ph); Quantum Physics (quant-ph).
Pagina del lavoro: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.10560 — autori e testo completo sono lì (qui omessi i nomi: nessun dato personale nel deposito).
Licenza: titolo e abstract sono metadati arXiv distribuiti in CC0 1.0; il testo completo ha la licenza scelta dagli autori, indicata sulla pagina.
Letto il 2026-10-19T05:50:27.109Z dalla pagina https://arxiv.org/catchup/quant-ph/2026-08-13?abs=True (consentita dal robots.txt di arxiv.org, con il suo crawl-delay).