ABSTRACT
The concept of homeostasis is perhaps the most important concept in physiology.1 From its origins in the work of Claude Bernard (Figure 10.1) in the 1800s,2 this concept has been rened over decades3,4 and is considered to be an essential part of cultural literacy in our days.1,5 As dened by the Commission for Thermal Physiology of the International Union of Physiological Sciences, homeostasis characterizes “the relative constancy of physico-chemical properties of the internal environment of an organism as being maintained by regulation.”6
