dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaElasticities and stabilities: lipid membranes vs cell membranes
| Authors | Z. C. Tu, R. An, Z. C. Ou-Yang |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | q-bio/0501001 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0501001 |
| Journal | Soft-condensed matter: new researches, pp. 325-337 (Nova, 2007) |
Abstract
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 mechanical properties. In this Chapter, above all, the authors give a brief introduction to some important work on mechanical properties of lipid bilayers following Helfrich's seminal work on spontaneous curvature energy of lipid bilayers. Next, the entropy of a polymer confined in a curved surface and the free energy of membrane cytoskeleton are obtained by scaling analysis. It is found that the free energy of cell membranes has the form of the in-plane strain energy plus Helfrich's curvature energy. The equations to describe equilibrium shapes and in-plane strains of cell membranes by osmotic pressures are obtained by taking the first order variation of the total free energy containing the elastic free energy, the surface tension energy and the term induced by osmotic pressure. The stability of spherical cell membrane is discussed and the critical pressure is found to be much larger than that of spherical lipid bilayer without membrane cytoskeleton. Lastly, the authors try to extend the present static mechanical model of cell membranes to the cell structure dynamics by proposing a group of coupling equations involving tensegrity architecture of cytoskeleton, fluid dynamics of cytoplasm and elasticities of cell membranes.
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"abstract": "A cell membrane can be simply regarded as composite material consisting of\nlipid bilayer, membrane cytoskeleton beneath lipid bilayer, and proteins\nembedded in lipid bilayer and linked with membrane cytoskeleton if one only\nconcerns its mechanical properties. In this Chapter, above all, the authors\ngive a brief introduction to some important work on mechanical properties of\nlipid bilayers following Helfrich\u0027s seminal work on spontaneous curvature\nenergy of lipid bilayers. Next, the entropy of a polymer confined in a curved\nsurface and the free energy of membrane cytoskeleton are obtained by scaling\nanalysis. It is found that the free energy of cell membranes has the form of\nthe in-plane strain energy plus Helfrich\u0027s curvature energy. The equations to\ndescribe equilibrium shapes and in-plane strains of cell membranes by osmotic\npressures are obtained by taking the first order variation of the total free\nenergy containing the elastic free energy, the surface tension energy and the\nterm induced by osmotic pressure. The stability of spherical cell membrane is\ndiscussed and the critical pressure is found to be much larger than that of\nspherical lipid bilayer without membrane cytoskeleton. Lastly, the authors try\nto extend the present static mechanical model of cell membranes to the cell\nstructure dynamics by proposing a group of coupling equations involving\ntensegrity architecture of cytoskeleton, fluid dynamics of cytoplasm and\nelasticities of cell membranes.",
"arxiv_id": "q-bio/0501001",
"authors": [
"Z. C. Tu",
"R. An",
"Z. C. Ou-Yang"
],
"categories": [
"q-bio.OT",
"q-bio.CB"
],
"journal_ref": "Soft-condensed matter: new researches, pp. 325-337 (Nova, 2007)",
"title": "Elasticities and stabilities: lipid membranes vs cell membranes",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0501001"
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