Related papers: Non-universal Impact of Cholesterol on Ionic Liqui…
Biological membranes are complex, dynamic structures essential for cellular compartmentalization, signaling, and mechanical integrity. The molecular organization of eukaryotic membranes has been extensively studied, including the lipid…
We study the effect of cholesterol on the structure of dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (DPPC) phospholipid bilayers. Using extensive molecular dynamics computer simulations at atomistic resolution we observe and quantify several structural…
Atherosclerotic plaques form in artery walls due to a chronic inflammatory response driven by lipid accumulation. A key component of the inflammatory response is the interaction between monocyte-derived macrophages and extracellular lipid.…
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…
We have studied the electrostatic screening effect of NaCl solutions on the interactions between anionic lipid bilayers in the fluid lamellar phase using a Poisson-Boltzmann based mean-field approach with constant charge and constant…
Cholesterol is known to modulate the structure and function of biological membranes. In this study, we use self-consistent field theory (SCFT) to investigate phospholipid/cholesterol bilayer membranes modeled with two types of diblock…
Much of our understanding of the physical properties of raft domains in biological membranes, and some insight into the mechanisms underlying their formation stem from atomistic simulations of simple model systems, especially ternary…
Enthalpic interactions at the interface between nanoparticles and matrix polymers is known to influence various properties of the resultant polymer nanocomposites (PNC). For athermal PNCs, consisting of grafted nanoparticles embedded in…
The transport of particles across lipid-bilayer membranes is important for biological cells to exchange information and material with their environment. Large particles often get wrapped by membranes, a process which has been intensively…
Premelting at the ice-polymer interfaces, in which a quasi-liquid layer (QLL) forms below the melting point, is strongly influenced by polymer surface chemistry; however, the molecular-scale mechanisms underlying these effects remain poorly…
The supramolecular assembly of lipids into bilayer membranes is essential for cellular structure and function. However, the impact of lipid structural variations such as acyl chain length, degree of unsaturation, and headgroup type on…
Differential microcalorimetric measurements have been performed in aqueous dispersions of dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine (DMPC) multilamellar vesicles in a wide range of temperatures covering the whole transition between the lamellar gel…
Membrane organization is essential for cellular functions such as signal transduction and membrane trafficking. A major challenge is to understand the lateral heterogeneous structures in membranes and membrane fluidity in the presence of…
Much progress has been made in elucidating the inner workings of voltage-gated ion channels, but less understood is the influence of lipid rafts on gating kinetics. Here we propose that state-dependent channel affinity for different lipid…
Ionic liquid crystals (ILCs) are anisotropic mesogenic molecules which additionally carry charges. This combination gives rise to a complex interplay of the underlying (anisotropic) contributions to the pair interactions. It promises…
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…
We report the effect of lipid head-group dipole orientation on phase behaviour of phospholipid assembly. The work explains molecular-scale mechanism of ion-lipid, anesthetic-lipid interactions where reorientation of dipoles play important…
Cellular membranes are a heterogeneous mix of lipids, proteins and small molecules. Special groupings of saturated lipids and cholesterol form a liquid-ordered phase, known as `lipid rafts,' serving as platforms for signaling, trafficking…
Lithium salts have strong medical properties in neurological disorders such as bipolar disorder and lithium-responsive headaches. They have recently gathered attention due to their potential preventive effect in viral infections. Though the…
Soluble alpha-amylases play an important role in the catabolism of polysaccharides. In this work, we show that the enzyme can interact with the lipid membrane and further alter its mechanical properties. Vesicle fluctuation spectroscopy is…