Comparative study of the dynamics of lipid membrane phase decomposition in experiment and simulation.

Phase decomposition in lipid membranes has been the subject of numerous investigations by both experiment and theoretical simulation, yet quantitative comparisons of the simulated data to the experimental results are rare. In this work, we present a novel way of comparing the temporal development of liquid-ordered domains obtained from numerically solving the Cahn-Hilliard equation and by inducing a phase transition in giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs). Quantitative comparison is done by calculating the structure factor of the domain pattern.

Phase-transition- and dissipation-driven budding in lipid vesicles.

Membrane budding has been extensively studied as an equilibrium process attributed to the formation of coexisting domains or changes in the vesicle area-to-volume ratio (reduced volume). In contrast, non-equilibrium budding remains experimentally widely unexplored, especially when timescales fall well below the characteristic diffusion time of lipids, tau. We show that localized mechanical perturbations, initiated by driving giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) through their lipid main phase transition from the gel to the fluid phase, lead to the immediate formation of rapidly growing, localized, non-equilibrium buds when the transition takes place at short timescales ( View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Phase transition induced adhesion of giant unilamellar vesicles.

Cell and vesicle adhesion is believed to be dictated by the balance between a local interaction potential, which represents the sum of all attractive and repulsive forces and the elastic energy. Changing the mechanical properties of the membrane therefore offers a sensitive tool to control vesicle adhesion. Here, we take advantage of the dramatic changes in area per molecule, fluidity and compressibility during lipid phase transition to alter vesicle adhesion.