Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom.
Centre for Complexity Science, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom.
Phys Rev Lett. 2015 Mar 6;114(9):098101. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.114.098101. Epub 2015 Mar 2.
We study the effect of transmembrane proteins on the shape, composition, and thermodynamic stability of the surrounding membrane. When the coupling between membrane composition and curvature is strong enough, the nearby membrane composition and shape both undergo a transition from overdamped to underdamped spatial variation, well before the membrane becomes unstable in the bulk. This transition is associated with a change in the sign of the thermodynamic energy and, hence, favors the early stages of coat assembly necessary for vesiculation (budding) and may suppress the activity of mechanosensitive membrane channels and transporters. Our results suggest an approach to obtain physical parameters of the membrane that are otherwise difficult to measure.
我们研究了跨膜蛋白对周围膜的形状、组成和热力学稳定性的影响。当膜组成和曲率之间的耦合足够强时，附近的膜组成和形状都会从过阻尼到欠阻尼的空间变化，而在膜在整体上变得不稳定之前。这种转变与热力学能量的符号变化有关，因此有利于囊泡（出芽）所需的早期外壳组装阶段，并可能抑制机械敏感膜通道和转运蛋白的活性。我们的结果表明了一种获得膜物理参数的方法，否则这些参数很难测量。
