Lipid Driven Nanodomains in Giant Lipid Vesicles are Fluid and Disordered

0476382 - ÚFCH JH 2018 RIV GB eng J - Journal Article
Koukalová, Alena - Amaro, Mariana - Aydogan, Gokcan - Gröbner, G. - Williamson, P. T. F. - Mikhalyov, I. - Hof, Martin - Šachl, Radek
Lipid Driven Nanodomains in Giant Lipid Vesicles are Fluid and Disordered.
Scientific Reports. Roč. 7, JUL 2017 (2017), č. článku 5460. ISSN 2045-2322. E-ISSN 2045-2322
R&D Projects: GA ČR GA17-03160S
Institutional support: RVO:61388955
Keywords : FLUORESCENCE CORRELATION SPECTROSCOPY * PLASMA-MEMBRANE VESICLES * RESONANCE ENERGY-TRANSFER
OECD category: Physical chemistry
Impact factor: 4.122, year: 2017
Method of publishing: Open access

It is a fundamental question in cell biology and biophysics whether sphingomyelin (SM)- and cholesterol
(Chol)- driven nanodomains exist in living cells and in model membranes. Biophysical studies on model
membranes revealed SM and Chol driven micrometer-sized liquid-ordered domains. Although the
existence of such microdomains has not been proven for the plasma membrane, such lipid mixtures
have been often used as a model system for ‘rafts’. On the other hand, recent super resolution and
single molecule results indicate that the plasma membrane might organize into nanocompartments.
However, due to the limited resolution of those techniques their unambiguous characterization
is still missing. In this work, a novel combination of Förster resonance energy transfer and Monte
Carlo simulations (MC-FRET) identifies directly 10 nm large nanodomains in liquid-disordered model
membranes composed of lipid mixtures containing SM and Chol. Combining MC-FRET with solidstate
wide-line and high resolution magic angle spinning NMR as well as with fluorescence correlation
spectroscopy we demonstrate that these nanodomains containing hundreds of lipid molecules are fluid
and disordered. In terms of their size, fluidity, order and lifetime these nanodomains may represent a
relevant model system for cellular membranes and are closely related to nanocompartments suggested
to exist in cellular membranes.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0272893