Integral Representation of Electrostatic Interactions inside a Lipid Membrane

Autor: Guilherme Volpe Bossa, Sylvio May
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2020
Předmět:
Zdroj: Molecules, Vol 25, Iss 17, p 3824 (2020)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 1420-3049
DOI: 10.3390/molecules25173824
Popis: Interactions between charges and dipoles inside a lipid membrane are partially screened. The screening arises both from the polarization of water and from the structure of the electric double layer formed by the salt ions outside the membrane. Assuming that the membrane can be represented as a dielectric slab of low dielectric constant sandwiched by an aqueous solution containing mobile ions, a theoretical model is developed to quantify the strength of electrostatic interactions inside a lipid membrane that is valid in the linear limit of Poisson-Boltzmann theory. We determine the electrostatic potential produced by a single point charge that resides inside the slab and from that calculate charge-charge and dipole-dipole interactions as a function of separation. Our approach yields integral representations for these interactions that can easily be evaluated numerically for any choice of parameters and be further simplified in limiting cases.
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