Wrapping of Microparticles by Floppy Lipid Vesicles

Abstract

Lipid membranes, the barrier defining living cells and many of their sub-compartments, bind to a wide variety of nano- and micro-meter sized objects. In the presence of strong adhesive forces, membranes can strongly deform and wrap the particles, an essential step in crossing the membrane for a variety of health and disease-related processes. A large body of theoretical and numerical work has focused on identifying the physical properties that underly wrapping. Using a model system of micron-sized colloidal particles and giant unilamellar lipid vesicles with tunable adhesive forces, we measure a wrapping phase diagram and make quantitative comparisons to theoretical models. Our data is consistent with a model of membrane-particle interactions accounting for the adhesive energy per unit area, membrane bending rigidity, particle size, and vesicle radius.

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Cited by in corpus (4)

• Dynamic shapes of floppy vesicles enclosing active Brownian particles with membrane adhesion
• Wrapping pathways of anisotropic dumbbell particles by giant unilamellar vesicles
• Entry of Microparticles into Giant Lipid Vesicles by Optical Tweezers
• Rotational and translational drags of a Janus particle close to a wall and a lipid membrane