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Updated: Jun 6, 2026

Ligand Nano-cluster Arrays in a Supported Lipid Bilayer
Published on: April 23, 2017
Clustered diffusion of integrins
David Lepzelter1, Muhammad H Zaman
1Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Abstract:
We discuss the diffusion of clusters of integrins (and other similar membrane proteins) on a cell membrane with a cortical cytoskeleton. We argue that protein clusters--in contrast with normal oligomers, which are forced to pass through cytoskeletal barriers all at once--should be treated essentially as many-legged random walkers that can pass through a cytoskeletal barrier by putting one leg at a time through the fence. We present the mathematics that should describe the phenomenon, which result in a two-parameter model of diffusion that should apply to any cluster size. We also perform and discuss numerical simulations of the effect in the erythrocyte model system.
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