Related papers: The elastic capacitor and its unusual properties
For many biotechnological applications it would be useful to better understand the effects produced by electric fields on lipid membranes. This review discusses several aspects of the electrostatic properties of a planar lipid membrane with…
Biomembranes are thin capacitors with the unique feature of displaying phase transitions in a physiologically relevant regime. We investigate the voltage and lateral pressure dependence of their capacitance close to their chain melting…
A continuum electromechanical model is proposed to describe the membrane curvature induced by electrostatic interactions in a solvated protein-membrane system. The model couples the macroscopic strain energy of membrane and the…
A cell membrane can be simply regarded as composite material consisting of lipid bilayer, membrane cytoskeleton beneath lipid bilayer, and proteins embedded in lipid bilayer and linked with membrane cytoskeleton if one only concerns its…
Cells and cellular organelles are encapsulated by nanometrically thin membranes whose main component is a lipid bilayer. In the presence of electric fields, the ion-impermeable lipid bilayer acts as a capacitor and supports a potential…
The elastic properties of a self-assembled bilayer membrane are studied using the self-consistent field theory, applied to a model system composed of flexible amphiphilic chains dissolved in hydrophilic polymeric solvents. Examining the…
In biological settings membranes typically interact locally with other membranes or the extracellular matrix in the exterior, as well as with internal cellular structures such as the cytoskeleton. Characterization of the dynamic properties…
The effect of AC electric fields on the elasticity of supported lipid bilayers has been investigated at the microscopic level using grazing incidence synchrotron x-ray scattering. A strong decrease in the membrane tension up to 1mN/m and a…
We introduce the "leaking elastic capacitor" (LEC) model, a nonconservative dynamical system that combines simple electrical and mechanical degrees of freedom. We show that an LEC connected to an external voltage source can be destabilized…
We propose a very simple but realistic enough model which allows to include a large number of molecules in molecular dynamics MD simulations of these bilayers, but nevertheless taking into account molecular charge distributions, flexible…
Simulating protein-membrane interactions is an important and dynamic area of research. A proper definition of electrostatic forces on membrane surfaces is necessary for developing electromechanical models of protein-membrane interactions.…
We present a novel approach to probe elastic properties of polyelectrolyte multilayer microcapsules. The method is based on measurements of the capsule load-deformation curves with the atomic force microscope. The experiment suggests that…
Lipid membranes are abundant in living organisms, where they constitute a surrounding shell for cells and their organelles. There are many circumstances in which the deformations of lipid membranes are involved in living cells: fusion and…
We investigate the effect of an applied electric potential on the mechanics of a coarse grained POPC bilayer under tension. The size and duration of our simulations allow for a detailed and accurate study of the fluctuations. Effects on the…
We study a phenomenological electropermeabilization model in a periodic medium representing biological tissue. Starting from a cell-level model describing the electric potential and the degree of porosity, we perform dimension analysis to…
It is well known that lipid membranes respond to a threshold transmembrane electric field through a reversible mechanism called electroporation, where hydrophilic water pores form across the membrane, an effect widely used in biological…
Dielectric elastomers are widely studied for their use in robotic and medical devices due to their shape changing properties. Recently, they have also been incorporated into acoustic devices, motivating the development of an electroacoustic…
The recent discovery of electro-active polymers has shown great promises in the field of soft robotics, and was logically followed by experimental, numerical and theoretical developments. Most of these studies were concerned with systems…
We derive a mathematical model for the motion of several insulating rigid bodies through an electrically conducting fluid. Starting from a universal model describing this phenomenon in generality, we elaborate (simplifying) physical…
Electrochemical phenomena in biology often unfold in confined geometries where micrometer- to millimeter-scale domains coexist with nanometer-scale interfacial diffuse charge layers. We analyze a model lipid membrane-electrolyte system…