Related papers: Rapid Spontaneous Assembly of Single Component Lip…

The assembly of proteins in membranes plays a key role in many crucial cellular pathways. Despite their importance, characterizing transmembrane assembly remains challenging for experiments and simulations. Equilibrium molecular dynamics…

We present an analytically solvable model for self-assembly of a molecular complex on a filament. The process is driven by a seed molecule that undergoes facilitated diffusion, which is a search strategy that combines diffusion in…

Fluids with spatial density variations of single or mixed molecules play a key role in biophysics, soft matter and materials science. The fluid structures usually form via spinodal decomposition or nucleation following an instantaneous…

We propose a simple mechanism for the self-replication of protocells. Our main hypothesis is that the amphiphilic molecules composing the membrane bilayer are synthesised inside the protocell through globally exothermic chemical reactions.…

We develop a self-consistent free-energy framework in which membrane shape and osmotic pressure are determined simultaneously in a finite reservoir by minimizing bending elasticity and solute entropy. Solute conservation makes osmotic…

In recent experiments [T. Basta et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 111, 670 (2014)] lipids and membrane proteins were observed to self-assemble into membrane protein polyhedral nanoparticles (MPPNs) with a well-defined polyhedral protein…

Controlling the size and shape of assembled structures is a fundamental challenge in self-assembly, and is highly relevant in material design and biology. Here, we show that specific, but promiscuous, short-range binding interactions make…

Lipid membranes form the barrier between the inside and outside of cells and many of their subcompartments. As such, they bind to a wide variety of nano- and micrometer sized objects and, in the presence of strong adhesive forces, strongly…

We use computer simulations to study a model, first proposed by Wales [1], for the reversible and monodisperse self-assembly of simple icosahedral virus capsid structures. The success and efficiency of assembly as a function of…

Using Monte Carlo simulations, we investigate the self-assembly of model nanoparticles inside a matrix of model equilibrium polymers (or matrix of Wormlike micelles) as a function of the polymeric matrix density and the excluded volume…

Many biological and synthetic materials self-assemble into helical or twisted aggregates. The shape is determined by a complex interplay between elastic forces and the orientation and chirality of the constituent molecules. We study this…

The fluid phase diagram of trimer particles composed of one central attractive bead and two repulsive beads was determined as a function of simple geometric parameters using flat-histogram Monte Carlo methods. A variety of self-assembled…

Working in a three-dimensional variant of Winfree's abstract Tile Assembly Model, we show that, for all $N \in \mathbb{N}$, there is a tile set that uniquely self-assembles into an $N \times N$ square shape at temperature 1 with optimal…

The desire to create cell-like models for fundamental science and applications has spurred extensive effort towards creating giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs). However, a route to selectively self-assemble GUVs in bulk has remained elusive.…

Motivated by recent studies of two-phase lipid vesicles possessing 2D solid domains integrated within a fluid bilayer phase, we study the shape equilibria of closed vesicles possessing a single planar, circular inclusion. While 2D solid…

Ellipsoidal particles confined at liquid interfaces exhibit complex self-assembly behaviour due to quadrupolar capillary interactions induced by meniscus deformation. These interactions cause particles to attract each other in either…

We study theoretically in the present work the self-assembly of molecules in an open system, which is fed by monomers and depleted in partial or complete clusters. Such a scenario is likely to occur for example in the context of viral…

Small particles transported by a fluid medium do not necessarily have to follow the flow. We show that for a wide class of time-periodic incompressible flows inertial particles have a tendency to spontaneously align in one-dimensional…

We conduct a systematic exploration of the energy landscape of vesicle morphologies within the framework of the Helfrich model. Vesicle shapes are determined by minimizing the elastic energy subject to constraints of constant area and…

Self-assembly of proteins is a biological phenomenon which gives rise to spontaneous formation of amyloid fibrils or polymers. The starting point of this phase, called nucleation exhibits an important variability among replicated…