Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 12, 2025

Neutron Spin Echo Spectroscopy as a Unique Probe for Lipid Membrane Dynamics and Membrane-Protein Interactions
Published on: May 27, 2021
Cholesterol-Induced Nanoscale Variations in the Thickness of Phospholipid Membranes
Tao Chen1, Arindam Ghosh1, Jörg Enderlein1,2
1Third Institute of Physics - Biophysics, Georg August University, Friedrich-Hund-Platz 1, 37077 Göttingen, Germany.
Abstract:
Graphene-induced energy transfer (GIET) is a recently developed fluorescence-spectroscopic technique that achieves subnanometric optical localization of fluorophores along the optical axis of a microscope. GIET is based on the near-field energy transfer from an optically excited fluorescent molecule to a single sheet of graphene. It has been successfully used for estimating interleaflet distances of single lipid bilayers and for investigating the membrane organization of living mitochondria. In this study, we use GIET to measure the cholesterol-induced subtle changes of membrane thickness at the nanoscale. We quantify membrane thickness variations in supported lipid bilayers (SLBs) as a function of lipid composition and increasing cholesterol content. Our findings demonstrate that GIET is an extremely sensitive tool for investigating nanometric structural changes in biomembranes.
Related Concept Videos
Asymmetric Lipid Bilayer
Membrane Fluidity
Synthesis of Phosphatidylcholine in the ER Membrane
The major components of all eukaryotic cell...
Assembly of the Lipid Bilayer in the ER
A large chunk of any biological membrane is composed of phospholipids. These lipids have a heterogeneous distribution across different subcellular organelles and even between...
Mechanisms of Membrane Domain Formation
Another mechanism for membrane domain formation involves membrane proteins interacting with...
Membrane Domains
Protein Domains
The membrane comprises a group of distinct proteins responsible for carrying out a cell's specific function. For example, the plasma membrane of the human sperm, or a single germ cell, contains a unique set of proteins in the...

