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Updated: Jul 16, 2026

Real Time Measurements of Membrane Protein:Receptor Interactions Using Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR)
Published on: November 29, 2014
Impact of polymer tether length on multiple ligand-receptor bond formation
C Jeppesen1, J Y Wong, T L Kuhl
1Materials Research Laboratory, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA.
Abstract:
The promoters of cell adhesion are ligands, which are often attached to flexible tethers that bind to surface receptors on adjacent cells. Using a combination of Monte Carlo simulations, diffusion reaction theory, and direct experiments (surface force measurements) of the biotin-streptavidin system, we have quantified polymer chain dynamics and the kinetics and spatial range of tethered ligand-receptor binding. The results show that the efficiency of strong binding does not depend solely on the molecular architecture or binding energy of the receptor-ligand pair, nor on the equilibrium configuration of the polymer tether, but rather on its "rare" extended conformations.
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