Abstract
Freezing and desiccation injury in living organism (mechanical stress, fusion, aggregation and degeneration) is believed to be associated fundamentally with the behavior of water molecules in the organism living under such an extreme condition. This common understanding highlights the importance of water molecule, namely bound water, which interacts with biomolecules and/or cryo/lyo-protective agents. In this review, first the roles of bound water in biosystems are discussed, followed by introducing the several quantifying method of bound water. Thereafter, the recent author's results from the dielectric spectroscopy of bound water in gelatin-gel are discussed, in which the relationship between relaxation time of bound water and freezing / desiccation is suggested.
