Related papers: Elastic moderation of intrinsically applied tensio…
The function of membrane-embedded proteins such as ion channels depends crucially on their conformation. We demonstrate how conformational changes in asymmetric membrane proteins may be inferred from measurements of their diffusion. Such…
A theoretical model of a two-component fluid membrane containing lipids and two-state active inclusions is presented. Under strong inclusion activities the membrane can be unstable due to pump-driven undulation or aggregation of high…
It is well known that lipid membranes respond to a threshold transmembrane electric field through a reversible mechanism called electroporation, where hydrophilic water pores form across the membrane, an effect widely used in biological…
Up-down asymmetric inclusions impose a local, spontaneous curvature to an elastic membrane. When several of them are inserted in a same membrane, they feel effective forces mediated by the membrane, both of elastic and entropic nature.…
Molecular rotors form twisted conformations upon photoexcitation, with their fluorescent relaxation time serving as a measure of viscosity. They have been used to assess membrane viscosities but yield higher values compared to other…
Recent experiments have exploited elastic instabilities in membranes to create complex patterns. However, the rational design of such structures poses many challenges, as they are products of nonlinear elastic behavior. We pose a simple…
This review describes the analytical calculation of lateral pressure profile in lipid membrane with finite curvature. The derivation is based on the previously developed microscopic model of flexible strings [1,2]. According to this theory…
Cellularized tissue and polymer networks can both transition from floppy to rigid as a function of their control parameters, and, yet, the two systems often mechanically interact, which may affect their respective rigidities. To study this…
Plastic materials can carry memory of past mechanical treatment in the form of internal stress. We introduce a natural definition of the vorticity of internal stress in a simple two-dimensional model of elasto-plastic fluids, which…
Biomembranes are thin capacitors with the unique feature of displaying phase transitions in a physiologically relevant regime. We investigate the voltage and lateral pressure dependence of their capacitance close to their chain melting…
We present a theory that combines the framework of irreversible thermodynamics with modified integral theorems to model arbitrarily curved and deforming membranes immersed in bulk fluid solutions. We study the coupling between the mechanics…
We perform a variational analysis of an elastic membrane spanning a closed curve which may sustain bending and torsion. First, we deal with parametrized curves and linear elastic membranes proving the existence of equilibria and finding…
The behavior of lipid membranes in the presence of an external electric field is studied and used to examine the influence of such fields on membrane parameters such as roughness and show that for a micro sized membrane, roughness grows as…
The lateral diffusion of lipids within membrane is of paramount importance, serving as a central mechanism in numerous physiological processes including cell signaling, membrane trafficking, protein activity regulation, and energy…
Many organisms have an elastic skeleton that consists of a closed shell of epithelial cells that is filled with fluid, and can actively regulate both elastic forces in the shell and hydrostatic pressure inside it. In this work we introduce…
The concept of a non-equilibrium interfacial tension, defined via the work required to deform the system such that the interfacial area is changed while the volume is conserved, is investigated theoretically in the context of the relaxation…
Actin flow in the cortical cytoskeleton underneath the cell membrane generates mechanical stresses that shape the cell surface. We study this mechanism using a hydrodynamic model of a compressible active gel polymerizing at the membrane and…
We study the stress distribution profiles and the height and thickness fluctuations of lipid membranes in the tilted gel state by Monte Carlo simulations of a generic coarse-grained model for lipid membranes, which reproduces many known…
The adhesion bonds connecting a lipid bilayer to an underlying surface may undergo a condensation transition resulting from an interplay between a short range attractive potential between them, and a long range fluctuation-induced potential…
Soft solids with tunable mechanical response are at the core of new material technologies, but a crucial limit for applications is their progressive aging over time, which dramatically affects their functionalities. The generally accepted…