Related papers: Morphology and Interaction between Lipid Domains
Biological membranes typically contain a large number of different components dispersed in small concentrations in the main membrane phase, including proteins, sugars, and lipids of varying geometrical properties. Most of these components…
Membrane shape fluctuations induce attractive interactions between rigid inclusions. Previous analytical studies showed that the fluctuation-induced pair interactions are rather small compared to thermal energies, but also that multi-body…
We numerically investigate the hydrodynamics and membrane dynamics of multicomponent vesicles in two strongly confined geometries. This serves as a simplified model for red blood cells undergoing large deformations while traversing narrow…
Liquid-liquid phase separation is important across biology, physics, and materials science. Although usually studied at equilibrium, active components - such as motor proteins, enzymes, and synthetic microswimmers - are increasingly…
We study the dynamic structure of lipid domain inclusions embedded within a phase-separated reconstituted lipid bilayer in contact with a swarming flow of gliding filamentous actin. Passive circular domains transition into highly-deformed…
We discuss different mechanisms for curvature-induced domain formation in multicomponent lipid membranes and present a theoretical model that allows us to study the interplay between the domains. The model represents the membrane by two…
We study the equilibrium conformations of a lipid domain on a planar fluid membrane where the domain is decorated by a vector field representing the tilt of the stiff fatty acid chains of the lipid molecules, while the surrounding membrane…
Lipid bilayer membranes are not uniform and clusters of lipids in a more ordered state exist within the generally disorder lipid milieu of the membrane. These clusters of ordered lipids microdomains are now referred to as lipid rafts.…
Biomembranes, which are mainly composed of neutral and charged lipids, exhibit a large variety of functional structures and dynamics. Here, we report a coarse-grained molecular dynamics (MD) simulation of the phase separation and…
Understanding the (de)mixing behavior of multicomponent lipid bilayers is an important step towards unraveling the nature of spatial composition heterogeneities in cellular membranes and their role in biological function. We use…
Microphase separation of membrane components is thought to play an important role in many physiological processes, from cell signaling to endocytosis and cellular trafficking. Here, we study how variations in the membrane composition can be…
The cell cortex, a thin film of active material assembled below the cell membrane, plays a key role in cellular symmetry breaking processes such as cell polarity establishment and cell division. Here, we present a minimal model of the…
Biological membranes are dynamic surfaces whose shape and function are critically influenced by protein inclusions (PIs). While membrane deformations induced by PIs have been extensively studied in the small-deformation regime, a variety of…
Much progress has been made in elucidating the inner workings of voltage-gated ion channels, but less understood is the influence of lipid rafts on gating kinetics. Here we propose that state-dependent channel affinity for different lipid…
Many protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks take place in the fluid yet structured plasma membrane. Lipid domains, sometimes termed rafts, have been implicated in the functioning of various membrane-bound signaling processes. Here, we…
Most biological molecules contain acido-basic groups that modulate their structure and interactions. A consequence is that pH gradients, local heterogeneities and dynamic variations are used by cells and organisms to drive or regulate…
Phase separation of multicomponent liquid mixtures plays an integral part in many processes ranging from industry to cellular biology. In many cases the morphology of coexisting phases is crucially linked to the function of the separated…
Morphological transitions of phase separation associated with the asymmetry of lipid composition were investigated using micrometer-sized vesicles of lipid bilayers made from a lipid mixture. The complete macro-phase-separated morphology…
We discuss a realistic scenario, accounting for the existence of sub-micrometric protein domains in cell membranes. At the biological level, such membrane domains have been shown to be specialized, in order to perform a determined…
Lipid bilayer membranes are the fundamental biological barriers that permit life. The bilayer dynamics largely participates in orchestrating cellular workings and is characterized by substantial stability together with extreme plasticity…