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Lipid membranes, the barrier defining living cells and many of their sub-compartments, bind to a wide variety of nano- and micro-meter sized objects. In the presence of strong adhesive forces, membranes can strongly deform and wrap the…
Cells offer numerous inspiring examples where proteins and membranes combine to form complex structures that are key to intracellular compartmentalization, cargo transport, and specialization of cell morphology. Despite this wealth of…
Biological membranes are elastic media in which the presence of a transmembrane protein leads to local bilayer deformation. The energetics of deformation allow two membrane proteins in close proximity to influence each other's equilibrium…
We construct a coarse-grained (CG) model for dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (DPPC)/cholesterol bilayers and apply it to large-scale simulation studies of lipid membranes. Our CG model is a two-dimensional representation of the membrane,…
Extensive microscopic molecular dynamics simulations have been performed to study the effects of short-chain alcohols, methanol and ethanol, on two different fully hydrated lipid bilayer systems in the fluid phase at 323 K. It is found that…
A molecular model is proposed of a bilayer consisting of fully saturated DPPC and mono unsaturated DOPC. The model not only encompasses the constant density within the hydrophobic core of the bilayer, but also the tendency of chain segments…
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…
Optical nanoantennas can efficiently confine light into nanoscopic hotspots, enabling single-molecule detection sensitivity at biological relevant conditions. This innovative approach to breach the diffraction limit offers a versatile…
We theoretically investigate the dynamics of a floating lipid bilayer membrane coupled with a two-dimensional cytoskeleton network, taking into explicitly account the intermonolayer friction, the discrete lattice structure of the…
With the aim of establishing a criterion for identifying when a lipid bilayer has reached steady state using the molecular dynamics simulation technique, lipid bilayers of different composition in their liquid crystalline phase were…
The plasma membrane of human red blood cells consists of a lipid bilayer attached to a regular network of underlying cytoskeletal polymers. We model this system at a dynamic coarse-grained level, treating the bilayer as an elastic sheet and…
The red blood cell (RBC) membrane is composed of a lipid bilayer and a cytoskeleton interconnected by protein junction complexes, allowing for potential sliding between the lipid bilayer and the cytoskeleton. Despite this biological…
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…
Nucleosomes organize the folding of DNA into chromatin and significantly influence transcription, replication, regulation and repair. All atom molecular dynamics simulations of a nucleosome and of its 146 basepairs of DNA free in solution…
Animal cells are both encapsulated and subdivided by lipid bilayer membranes. Beyond just acting as boundaries, these membranes' shapes influence the function of cells and their compartments. Physically, membranes are two-dimensional fluids…
We introduce a simulation strategy to consistently couple continuum biomembrane dynamics to the motion of discrete biological macromolecules residing within or on the membrane. The methodology is used to study the diffusion of integral…
Recent developments in lipid membrane models for simulations are reviewed. To reduce computational costs, various coarse-grained molecular models have been proposed. Among them, implicit solvent (solvent-free) molecular models are…
Translational motion of neurotransmitter receptors is key for determining receptor number at the synapse and hence, synaptic efficacy. We combine live-cell STORM superresolution microscopy of nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) with…
A phenomenological Landau elasticity for the shape, dilation, and lipid-tilt of bilayer membranes is developed. The shape mode couples with the sum of the monolayers' tilt, while the dilation mode couples with the difference of the…
Cells use homeostatic mechanisms to maintain an optimal composition of distinct types of phospholipids in cellular membranes. The hydrophilic dipolar layer at the membrane interface, composed of phospholipid headgroups, regulates the…