Experimental determination of the entropic potential between supported fluctuating lipid bilayers

The interaction potential between supported floating bilayers has been determined by grazing incidence specular and off-specular scattering using synchrotron radiation. Our measurements demonstrate that floating bilayers are significantly more hydrated than the usually studied multilayers, therefore...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2012-05
Main Authors: Malaquin, L, Charitat, T, Daillant, J, Lecuyer, S, Fragneto, G
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Lipids
Multilayers
Synchrotron radiation
Variation
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The interaction potential between supported floating bilayers has been determined by grazing incidence specular and off-specular scattering using synchrotron radiation. Our measurements demonstrate that floating bilayers are significantly more hydrated than the usually studied multilayers, therefore giving access to more intrinsic properties of the membranes. At equilibrium, the interaction potential can be two orders of magnitude softer than previously reported, which can be explained by the weak electrostatic interaction due to the small fraction (sigma ~ 0.001 e\(^-\)/nm\(^2\)) of ionized lipids in the bilayers. Our data are sensitive enough to discriminate between different functional forms of the entropic repulsion proposed in the literature, and the "soft" potential of R. Podgornik and V. Parsegian, Langmuir 8, 557 (1992) is shown to most appropriately describe our data.
ISSN:2331-8422