Lipid monolayer expansion by calcium-chlorotetracycline at the air/water interface and, as inferred from cell shape changes, in the human erythrocyte membrane.

Chemically induced shape changes of the human erythrocyte may result from cell membrane bending by surface tension changes at the lipid bilayer (Evans. E.A. (1974( Biophys. J. 14, 923-931) implicating differential expansion of the monolayers coupled to form the red cell membrane (Sheetz, M.P. and Singer, S.J. (1974) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 71, 4457-4461). Interacting with calcium, the antibiotic chlorotetracycline (CTC) transforms crenated cells (echinocytes) into cup-shaped ones (stomatocytes), presumably expanding thereby the red cell membrane inner leaflet relative to the outer one (Behn, C., Lübbemeier, A. and Weskamp, P. (1977) Pflügers Arch. 372, 259-268). Whether the Ca-CTC interaction with lipid monolayers may in fact expand the latter, has now been examined by surface tension measurements at the air/water interface. CTC and lipids appeared to compete for the available sites at the air/water interface, contributing additively to its surface pressure. Ca increased both the adsorption rate of the antibiotic to the interface and the CTC-induced surface pressure increment. The latter was not influenced by the subphase pH and ionic strength, or by the type of phospholipid polar head. Correspondingly, CTC-induced cell shape changes should be determined by the pCa values facing either monolayer of the erythrocyte membrane. Both stomatocytes and echinocytes could indeed by obtained with 0.5 mmol . 1(-1) CTC, the cell shape depending on whether the external medium was adjusted respectively to pCa 9 or to pCa 3. Fluorescence microscopy revealed the Ca-CTC complex to be mostly restricted to the cell in stomatocytes and to the external medium in echinocytes. The possibility of inducing alternative cell shapes by varying the transmembrane Ca-CTC distribution, and the demonstration of a Ca-dependent expansion of even relatively compressed lipid monolayers by CTC, together suggest that the Ca-CTC complex may also differentially expand either leaflet of the red cell membrane.