Lipid tail protrusions mediate the insertion of nanoparticles into model cell membranes

Van Lehn, R.C.; Ricci, M.; Silva, P.H.J.; Andreozzi, P.; Reguera, J.; Voïtchovsky, K.; Stellacci, F.; Alexander-Katz, A.

doi:10.1038/ncomms5482

Lipid tail protrusions mediate the insertion of nanoparticles into model cell membranes

Van Lehn, R.C.; Ricci, M.; Silva, P.H.J.; Andreozzi, P.; Reguera, J.; Voïtchovsky, K.; Stellacci, F.; Alexander-Katz, A.

Authors

R.C. Van Lehn

M. Ricci

P.H.J. Silva

P. Andreozzi

J. Reguera

Professor Kislon Voitchovsky kislon.voitchovsky@durham.ac.uk
Professor

F. Stellacci

A. Alexander-Katz

Abstract

Recent work has demonstrated that charged gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) protected by an amphiphilic organic monolayer can spontaneously insert into the core of lipid bilayers to minimize the exposure of hydrophobic surface area to water. However, the kinetic pathway to reach the thermodynamically stable transmembrane configuration is unknown. Here, we use unbiased atomistic simulations to show the pathway by which AuNPs spontaneously insert into bilayers and confirm the results experimentally on supported lipid bilayers. The critical step during this process is hydrophobic–hydrophobic contact between the core of the bilayer and the monolayer of the AuNP that requires the stochastic protrusion of an aliphatic lipid tail into solution. This last phenomenon is enhanced in the presence of high bilayer curvature and closely resembles the putative pre-stalk transition state for vesicle fusion. To the best of our knowledge, this work provides the first demonstration of vesicle fusion-like behaviour in an amphiphilic nanoparticle system.

Citation

Van Lehn, R., Ricci, M., Silva, P., Andreozzi, P., Reguera, J., Voïtchovsky, K., …Alexander-Katz, A. (2014). Lipid tail protrusions mediate the insertion of nanoparticles into model cell membranes. Nature Communications, 5, Article 4482. https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms5482

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Jun 23, 2014
Online Publication Date	Jul 21, 2014
Publication Date	Jul 21, 2014
Deposit Date	Aug 15, 2014
Publicly Available Date	Dec 11, 2014
Journal	Nature Communications
Publisher	Nature Research
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	5
Article Number	4482
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms5482