English

Morphogenesis of membrane invaginations in spherical confinement

Biological Physics 2012-03-26 v2 Soft Condensed Matter

Abstract

We study the morphology of a fluid membrane in spherical confinement. When the area of the membrane is slightly larger than the area of the outer container, a single axisymmetric invagination is observed. For higher area, self-contact occurs: the invagination breaks symmetry and deforms into an ellipsoid-like shape connected to its outer part via a small slit. For even higher areas, a second invagination forms inside the original invagination. The folding patterns observed could constitute basic building blocks in the morphogenesis of biological tissues and organelles.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1201.2518,
  title  = {Morphogenesis of membrane invaginations in spherical confinement},
  author = {Osman Kahraman and Norbert Stoop and Martin Michael Mueller},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1201.2518},
  year   = {2012}
}

Comments

4 pages, 3 figures, 1 table

R2 v1 2026-06-21T20:03:36.681Z