Abstract
The lipid composition of the eye lens membrane differs between the species. In the lower life span animals, eye lenses have phosphatidylcholine as a major component, while lenses have sphingomyelins as a major phospholipid in higher life span animals. Here, we study the mechanical properties of model membrane made of mouse phospholipid composition with Chol/PL mixing ratio of 0 and 1, respectively using Atomic force microscopy (AFM). The model membrane's height image with 0 mol% Chol shows two phases: solid ordered ( s o ) and liquid disordered ( l d ). The height difference between the two phases is ~ 1 nm. The model membrane with Chol/PL mixing ratio of 1 exhibit only a single-phase known as liquid-ordered phase (lo). Thus, the membrane roughness of Chol/PL mixing ratio of 1 is 152±8 pm which is significantly lower than the roughness of membrane with Chol/PL mixing ratio of 1, which is 241±36pm. Similarly, the average breakthrough force for the Chol/PL mixing ratio of 0 is 5.4±0.41 nN, while for Chol/PL mixing ratio of 1, the average breakthrough force is 4.88±0.58 nN. We speculate that this slight difference in the membrane breakthrough force may be due to two phases in the 0 mol% Chol-containing membrane.
| Original language | American English |
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| State | Published - 12 Apr 2021 |