Regensburg 2025 – scientific programme
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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 5: Membranes and Vesicles I
BP 5.6: Talk
Monday, March 17, 2025, 12:45–13:00, H46
Translocation of vesicles through membrane-covered pores — •Nishant Baruah1, Gerhard Gompper1, Anil Kumar Dasanna2, and Thorsten Auth1 — 1Theoretical Physics of Living Matter, Institute of Biological Information Processing and Institute for Advanced Simulation, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany — 2Department of Physical Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Mohali, Sector 81, Knowledge City, Mohali 140306, India
Apicomplexan parasites like Plasmodium, which transmits malaria, invade their host cells by translocating through a tight junction at the host plasma membrane. This process involves significant physical challenges, including the need for the parasite to deform its own membrane while squeezing through the tight junction and contending with the host membrane tension [1]. Here, we study as a model system the translocation of vesicles through membrane-covered pores driven by a contact interaction [2]. The calculations are performed using triangulated membranes and energy minimization. We predict stable translocation states for various vesicle- and host-membrane elastic properties and vesicle-to-pore size ratios. A finite-host membrane tension strongly suppresses pore translocation, which may explain protection against severe malaria in the Dantu blood group [3].
[1] S. Dasgupta et al, Biophys. J. 107, 43 (2014).
[2] N. Baruah et al. (https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.05.20.594296).
[3] S. N. Kariuki et al, Nature 585, 579 (2020).
Keywords: Parasite invasion; Continuum membrane model; Membrane deformation; Membrane tension