München 2019 – scientific programme

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P: Fachverband Plasmaphysik

P 18: Postersitzung

P 18.45: Poster

Thursday, March 21, 2019, 16:30–18:30, Foyer Audimax

Investigation of the interplay between electric fields in plasma and phospholipid membranes via molecular dynamics simulations — •Torge Appel and Michael Bonitz — Institute of Theoretical Physics and Astrophysics, University of Kiel, Germany

Cold atmospheric pressure plasmas (CAPP) are a common plasma source. Different investigations showed a significant potency against pathogenic organisms like bacteria and viruses and offer the possibility for a new area of applications in plasma medicine[1]. Beside temperature, radicals and uv-radiation, electric fields are one of the main active ingredients in CAPPs which can induce pore formation in lipid membranes [2]. The mixture of these components is highly dependent on the plasma source. To minimize the risk of medical applications on humans and to optimize the therapeutical efficacy, the knowledge of microscopical processes is important and a thorough understanding of the interplay between the biological cell and the ingredients of a plasma source is needed.
Here we investigate the effect of electric fields on model cell membranes, consisting of different single types of phoshpolipids (DPPC, DLPC, DMPC), which are common lipid types in eukaryotic cell membranes, via molecular dynamics simulations. To estimate the angular dependence and distribution of electric field induced pore formation both all-atom (CHARMM) and coarse-grained (MARTINI) force fields are used and all simulations are performed with GROMACS version 5.1.2.
Woedtke et al., Physics Reports 530, 291 (2013)
Levine et al., Membrane Biol 236, 27 (2010)