Developing Models from Static Images of How Constrained Release of Free Energy Produces Work in Biological Mechanisms

Philosophical accounts of biological mechanisms have only recently attended to the crucial role free energy plays in enabling the operation of mechanisms and have not addressed how scientists discover the role of free energy in the operation of biological mechanisms. To do so, I examine research on two mechanisms—the myosin motor in muscle contraction and the cyanobacterial circadian clock. I describe the discovery process in which researchers compare static images to determine the conformation changes in proteins produced by ATP hydrolysis and infer how these conformation changes generate forces that result in the phenomenon produced by the mechanism.