Phospholipid vesicle formation using nonionic detergents with low monomer solubility. Kinetic factors determine vesicle size and permeability.

The method developed previously for formation of unilamellar vesicles from mixed micelles of egg lecithin and octyl glucoside [Mimms, L. T., Zampighi, G., Nozaki, Y., Tanford, C., & Reynolds, J. A. (1981) Biochemistry 20, 833-840] has been extended to allow for (1) use of nonionic detergents with much lower critical micelle concentrations and (2) variation in the time course of detergent removal. The results demonstrate the importance of kinetic factors, especially in the determination of vesicle size: initially formed vesicles are small, but the size increases slowly thereafter if detergent is not removed too quickly. Vesicle size remains fixed when the molar detergent/lipid ratio falls below about 1/1, and detergent removal becomes increasingly difficult thereafter, presumably because flip-flop of detergent from the inner to the outer leaflet of the bilayer membrane is very slow. Residual detergent (to about 25 mol %) has surprisingly little effect on anion permeability but increases cation permeability to the point where the normal discrimination between anions and cations (in pure lipid vesicles) is lost. Detergent added to initially detergent-free vesicles readily partitions into vesicular membranes (presumably only into the outer leaflet) and has a qualitatively similar effect on permeability. Vesicles produced by this method, regardless of residual detergent level, were found to be predominantly unilamellar: no multilamellar liposomes or other lipid aggregates could be detected within the accuracy of the methods employed.