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Updated: Jan 9, 2026

In-vivo Detection of Protein-protein Interactions on Micro-patterned Surfaces
Published on: March 19, 2010
Repulsive Particle Interactions Enable Selective Information Processing at Cellular Interfaces
J Elliott1,2, H Shah1, R Belousov1
1European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Cell Biology and Biophysics Unit, Meyerhofstraße 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany.
None:
Living systems relay information across membrane interfaces to coordinate compartment functions. We identify a physical mechanism for selective information transmission that arises from the sigmoidal response of surface-bound particle densities to spatial features in adjacent external structures through a nonuniform binding energy. This mechanism implements a form of spatial thresholding, enabling the binary classification of external cues. Expansion microscopy measurements of nuclear pore complex distributions in S. arctica show signatures of such physical thresholding.
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