Critical pressures in multicomponent lipid monolayers.
Biochim Biophys Acta
; 1280(2): 169-72, 1996 Apr 26.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-8639690
ABSTRACT
Epifluorescence microscopy has been used previously to study coexisting liquid phases in lipid monolayers of dihydrocholesterol and dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine at the air/water interface. This binary mixture has a critical point at room temperature (22 degrees C), a monolayer pressure of approx. 10 mN/m, and a composition in the vicinity of 20-30 mol% dihydrocholesterol. It is reported here that this critical pressure can be lowered, raised, or maintained constant by systematically replacing molecules of this phosphatidylcholine with molecules of a phosphatidylethanolamine, or an unsaturated phosphatidylcholine, or mixtures of the two, while maintaining the dihydrocholesterol concentration at 20 mol%. Thus, even complex mixtures of lipids may be characterized by a single, well-defined second-order phase transition. In principle, such transitions might be found in biological membranes.
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Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Fosfolipídeos
/
Colestanol
Idioma:
En
Ano de publicação:
1996
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Estados Unidos