Effects of Disorder in Location and Size of Fence Barriers on Molecular Motion in Cell Membranes
Abstract
The effect of disorder in the energetic heights and in the physical locations of fence barriers encountered by transmembrane molecules such as proteins and lipids in their motion in cell membranes is studied theoretically. The investigation takes as its starting point a recent analysis of a periodic system with constant distances between barriers and constant values of barrier heights, and employs effective medium theory to treat the disorder. The calculations make possible, in principle, the extraction of confinement parameters such as mean compartment sizes and mean intercompartmental transition rates from experimentally reported published observations. The analysis should be helpful both as an unusual application of effective medium theory and as an investigation of observed molecular movements in cell membranes.
Recommended Citation
Z. Kalay et al., "Effects of Disorder in Location and Size of Fence Barriers on Molecular Motion in Cell Membranes," Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, Institute of Physics - IOP Publishing, Jun 2008.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/20/24/245105
Department(s)
Physics
Sponsor(s)
United States. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
National Science Foundation (U.S.)
Keywords and Phrases
Cell Membranes; Molecular Dynamics; Molecular Motion
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
0953-8984
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Citation
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2008 Institute of Physics - IOP Publishing, All rights reserved.
Publication Date
01 Jun 2008
