Set point (physiology)

A hypothesized target value around which a biological regulatory system controls a variable. The concept is used to explain regulation of variables such as body temperature and blood glucose.

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Homeostasis: The regulation of internal conditions within ranges compatible with organismal function. Set points offer one model for how homeostatic regulation maintains internal conditions.
Allostasis: The maintenance of stability through physiological change in response to demands. Allostasis highlights adaptive shifts in regulation rather than constancy around one target.
Fever: A regulated rise in body temperature, commonly triggered by infection or inflammation. Fever is often explained as an upward shift in the temperature set point.
Body weight set point: The hypothesis that physiological mechanisms defend body weight near a regulated target. Its proposed target can change over time, raising questions about what a set point represents.
Negative feedback: A control process in which a change triggers responses that oppose that change. Physiological regulators can counter deviations from a set point through negative feedback.
Deadband: A range of input values within which a control system does not change its output. A regulated variable may be allowed to fluctuate within a range instead of matching an exact value.
Pyrogen: A substance that induces fever by promoting changes in thermoregulatory signaling. Pyrogens help trigger the altered temperature target associated with fever.
Settling point model: An account in which body weight emerges from interacting biological, behavioral, and environmental influences. It contrasts a defended target with weight arising from ongoing influences without a fixed set point.
Thermoregulation: The processes organisms use to regulate body temperature. Temperature regulation is a familiar example of control around a hypothesized target.
Hysteresis: Dependence of a system's state on the path by which it reached that state. Different response thresholds can make physiological control unlike correction toward one fixed target.