Related papers: Curvature-driven molecular flows on membrane surfa…
Spatial organisation is a hallmark of all living cells, and recreating it in model systems is a necessary step in the creation of synthetic cells. It is therefore of both fundamental and practical interest to better understand the basic…
Membrane proteins are crucial in regulating biomembrane shapes and controlling the dynamic changes in membrane morphology during essential cellular processes. These proteins can localize to regions with their preferred curvatures (curvature…
Continuum or hybrid modeling of bilayer membrane morphological dynamics induced by embedded proteins necessitates the identification of protein-membrane interfaces and coupling of deformations of two surfaces. In this article we developed…
The viscosity of lipid bilayer membranes plays an important role in determining the diffusion constant of embedded proteins and the dynamics of membrane deformations, yet it has historically proven very difficult to measure. Here we…
Living cells employ excitable reaction-diffusion waves for internal cellular functions, in which curvature-inducing proteins are often involved. However, the role of their mechanochemical coupling is not well understood. Here, we report the…
Biological membranes constitute boundaries of cells and cell organelles. Physico-chemical mechanisms at the atomic scale are dictated by protein-lipid interaction strength, lipid composition, lipid distribution in the vicinity of the…
Induced by proteins within the cell membrane or by differential growth, heating, or swelling, spontaneous curvatures can drastically affect the morphology of thin bodies and induce mechanical instabilities. Yet, the interaction of…
Dynamics simulations of constrained particles can greatly aid in understanding the temporal and spatial evolution of biological processes such as lateral transport along membranes and self-assembly of viruses. Most theoretical efforts in…
The electrostatic contribution to spontaneous membrane curvature is calculated within Poisson-Boltzmann theory under a variety of assumptions and emphasizing parameters in the physiological range. Asymmetric surface charges, either fixed…
The motion of a eukaryotic cell presents a variety of interesting and challenging problems from both a modeling and a computational perspective. The processes span many spatial scales (from molecular to tissue) as well as disparate time…
In spite of the great success that all-atom molecular dynamics simulations have seen in revealing the nature of the lipid bilayer, the interplay between a membrane's curvature and dynamics remains elusive. This is largely due to the…
Colloids and proteins alike can bind to lipid bilayers and move laterally in these two-dimensional fluids. Inspired by proteins that generate membrane curvature, sense the underlying membrane geometry, and migrate to high curvature sites,…
Lipid bilayers often form high-curvature configurations due to self-assembly conditions or certain biological processes. However, particle-based simulations of lipid membranes are predominantly of flat lipid membranes because planar…
We use a simple and efficient computer model to investigate the physical properties of bilayer membranes. The amphiphilic molecules are modeled as short rigid trimers with finite range pair interactions between them. The pair potentials…
A model describing cell membranes as optimal shapes with regard to the $L^2$-deficit of their mean curvature to a given constant called spontaneous curvature is considered. It is shown that the corresponding energy functional is lower…
In this work, we study a phase-field model for curvature-driven pattern formation in biomembranes. The model is derived as a gradient flow of an energy functional that approximates the two-phase Canham--Helfrich energy. This leads to a…
The interplay of membrane proteins is vital for many biological processes, such as cellular transport, cell division, and signal transduction between nerve cells. Theoretical considerations have led to the idea that the membrane itself…
Water molecules play an important role in providing unique environments for biological reactions on cell membranes. It is widely believed that water molecules form bridges that connect lipid molecules and stabilize cell membranes. Using…
Using analytical calculations and computer simulations we consider both the lateral diffusion of a membrane protein and the fluctuation spectrum of the membrane in which the protein is embedded. The membrane protein interacts with the…
A coarse-grained molecular model, which consists of a spherical particle and an orientation vector, is proposed to simulate lipid membrane on a large length scale. The solvent is implicitly represented by an effective attractive interaction…