Role of Membrane Tension on Physical Properties of DOPC Lipid Bilayer

Abstract

Mechanical stimuli trigger a wide range of cellular and biochemical processes in the cell. However the underlying molecular mechanisms of this triggering process are not well established. Numerous studies have demonstrated that in many cases mechanochemical signal conversion originates at the cell membrane. In the present study, a series of systematic molecular dynamics simulations were performed to characterize the changes in dioleoylphosphatidylcholine (DOPC) lipid bilayer properties in response to the membrane tension. All simulations were carried out using NAMD program and CHARMM36 force field. Our studies show that membrane tension causes changes in membrane properties such as area per lipid, volume, membrane thickness, lateral diffusion and dipole potential. The results also indicate that the lateral diffusion of lipid molecules is anomalous in nature due to the non-exponential distribution of waiting times. The simulation results were compared with experimental data obtained from fluorescence spectroscopy experiments using fluorescent lipid tracers and dipole-potential sensitive fluorescent probes.