Related papers: Hydration Mimicry by Membrane Ion Channels
Aquaporins (AQPs) are recognized as transmembrane water channels that facilitate selective water permeation through their monomeric pores. Among the AQP family, AQP6 has a unique characteristic as an anion channel, which is allosterically…
We present a hydrodynamic theory describing pair diffusion in systems with periodic boundary conditions, thereby generalizing earlier work on self-diffusion [D\"unweg and Kremer, J. Chem. Phys. 1993, 99, 6983-6997; Yeh and Hummer, J. Phys.…
It is known that lipid membranes become permeable in their melting regime. In microscopic conductance measurements on black lipid membranes one finds that conduction takes place via quantized events closely resembling those reported for…
Major efforts in recent years have been directed towards understanding molecular transport in polymeric membranes, in particular reverse osmosis and nanofiltration membranes. Transition-state theory is an increasingly common approach to…
Graphene-based membranes have been investigated as promising candidates for water filtration and gas separation applications. Experimental evidences have shown that graphene oxide can be impermeable to liquids, vapors and gases, while…
Ion channels orchestrate the communication between cells and their environment. These are special proteins capable of changing their shape to allow ions to pass through membranes in response to stimuli like membrane tension. As the letters…
Within the quasichemical approach, the hydration free energy of an ion is decomposed into a chemical term accounting for ion specific ion-water interactions within the coordination sphere and nonspecific contributions accounting for packing…
Neutron scattering and molecular dynamics studies were performed on a concentrated aqueous tetramethylammonium (TMA) chloride solution to gain insight into the hydration shell structure of TMA, which is relevant for understanding its…
We have used molecular simulation and methods of importance sampling to study the thermodynamics and kinetics of ionic charge separation at a liquid water-metal interface. We have considered this process using canonical examples of two…
We study dynamics and thermodynamics of ion channels, considered as effective 1D Coulomb systems. The long range nature of the inter-ion interactions comes about due to the dielectric constants mismatch between the water and lipids,…
Ultrahigh water permeance, together with a high rejection rate through nanofiltration and separation membranes1,2, is crucial but still challenging for multivalent ion sieving in water treatment processes of desalination, separation, and…
Solvation of ions is ubiquitous on our planet. Solvated ions have a profound effect on the behavior of ionic solutions, which is crucial in nature and technology. Experimentally, ions have been classified into "structure makers" or…
Membrane ultrafiltration (UF) is a pressure driven process allowing for the separation and enrichment of protein solutions and dispersions of nanosized microgel particles. The permeate flux and the near-membrane concentration-polarization…
The binding of small metal ions to complex macromolecular structures is typically dominated by strong local interactions of the ion with its nearest ligands. For this reason, it is often possible to understand the microscopic origin of ion…
A model of mobile, charged ion channels embedded in a biomembrane is investigated. The ion channels fluctuate between an opened and a closed state according to a simple two-state reaction scheme whereas the total number of ion channels is a…
We investigate the outflux of ions through the channels in a cell membrane. The channels undergo an open/close cycle according to a periodic schedule. Our study is based both on theoretical considerations relying on homogenization theory,…
We have developed a molecular mean-field theory -- fourth-order Poisson-Nernst-Planck-Bikerman theory -- for modeling ionic and water flows in biological ion channels by treating ions and water molecules of any volume and shape with…
We present a coarse-grained model for ionic surfactants in explicit aqueous solutions, and study by computer simulation both the impact of water content on the morphology of the system, and the consequent effect of the formed interfaces on…
The uptake and sorption of charged molecules by responsive polymer membranes and hydrogels in aqueous solutions is of key importance for the development of soft functional materials. Here we investigate the partitioning of simple monoatomic…
Specific molecular interactions underlie unexpected and useful phenomena in nanofluidic systems, but require descriptions that go beyond traditional macroscopic hydrodynamics. In this letter, we demonstrate how equilibrium molecular…