Electrostatic interactions at the microscale modulate dynamics and distribution of lipids in bilayers

A. MANGIAROTTI Y N. WILKE

SOFT MATTER

ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY

Lugar: CAMBRIDGE; Año: 2017 vol. 13 p. 686 - 686

1744-683X

or decades, it has been assumed that electrostatic long-range (micron distances) repulsions in lipidbilayers are negligible due to screening from the aqueous milieu. This concept, mostly derived fromtheoretical calculations, is broadly accepted in the biophysical community. Here we present experimentalevidence showing that domain?domain electrostatic repulsions in charged and also in neutral lipid bilayersregulate the diffusion, in-plane structuring and merging of lipid domains in the micron range. All theexperiments were performed on both, lipid monolayers and bilayers, and the remarkable similarity in theresults found in bilayers compared to monolayers led us to propose that inter-domain repulsions occurmainly within the plane of the membrane. Finally, our results indicate that electrostatic interactionsbetween the species inserted in a cell membrane are not negligible, not only at nanometric but also atlarger distances, suggesti