ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of the key concepts in thermodynamics, which is based on the static equilibrium of physical systems as well as on processes that take physical systems from one equilibrium state to the next. It describes in substantial detail key metabolic processes of energy generation and energy transformations that form the basis of the biochemistry background needed to understand metabolic processes and metabolic diseases. The chapter interlocks the fundamental aspects of energy, entropy, and information with their relevance in the multidisciplinary context of the branches of endocrinology and metabolic health. It discusses perhaps the most important aspect of living systems, namely their ability and necessity to absorb external energy stored in the form of chemical bonds of nutritional substances and to transduce this energy into useful and directed outputs such as work and heat production for the maintenance of the living state.
