Dresden 2006 – scientific programme

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AKB: Biologische Physik

AKB 40: Poster Session II

AKB 40.9: Poster

Wednesday, March 29, 2006, 16:30–19:30, P3

Influence of lipid rafts on cell signalling — •Stefan Semrau and Thomas Schmidt — Biophysics, University Leiden

Heterogeneities such as lipid rafts are believed to play a major role in cell signalling by influencing the diffusion and localization of proteins in the plasma membrane. Colocalization of proteins seems to be crucial at the beginning of the signal transduction pathway. Lipid rafts, whose existence in living cells is suggested by many experiments, are cholesterol and sphingolipid enriched membrane domains in which the lipid phase is probably different from that of the environment. We study lipid rafts in controllable model systems that are much less complex than living cells but suitable to mimic lipid rafts: structured supported lipid bilayer membranes and giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) from lipid mixtures. The influence of e.g. the size, shape, boundary behaviour and composition of membrane domains on the diffusion of fluorescently labelled proteins or lipids is studied by single-molecule tracking and Monte-Carlo simulations.