SKM 2023 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 5: Focus Session NanoAgents

BP 5.6: Vortrag

Montag, 27. März 2023, 16:45–17:00, TOE 317

Monitoring the Switching dynamics of Photolipid Membranes with Plasmonic Nanorods — •Jinhua Zhang, Francis Schuknecht, Ludwig Habermann, Alexander Pattis, Stefanie Pritzl, and Theobald Lohmüller — Chair for Photonics and Optoelectronics, Nano-Institute Munich, Department of Physics, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Königinstraße 10, 80539 Munich, Germany

Photoswitchable lipids (i.e. photolipids) are intriguing nanoagents for controlling lipid membrane properties with light. However, analyzing the switching dynamics in a single lipid bilayer locally and in situ is challenging due to a lack of sensitive tools for detecting the very small changes in membrane thickness (< 1 nm). Here, we demonstrate a new approach to monitor the photoisomerization of photolipid membranes on the nanoscale via plasmonic sensing.

In our experiment, gold nanorods are deposited on a glass substrate and coated with a supported photolipid bilayer. The photosensitive azobenzene group in the lipid tails is switched between a trans and cis form by an illumination sequence with UV and blue light, while scattering spectra of individual nanorods are simultaneously measured. We find that the photoisomerization process of azobenzene leads to a reversible shift of the nanorod's plasmon resonance over many switching cycles. Our study shows that single nanorods may thus be used as sensitive probes to study isomerization dynamics and photostationary states of photolipid bilayer membranes within nanoscale environments.