Journal
SOFT MATTER
Volume 10, Issue 20, Pages 3570-3577Publisher
ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY
DOI: 10.1039/c3sm52498a
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- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) via the International Research Training Group 1524 Self-Assembled Soft Matter Nano-Structures at Interfaces
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The bioactivity of nanoparticles crucially depends on their ability to cross biomembranes. Recent simulations indicate the cooperative wrapping and internalization of spherical nanoparticles in tubular membrane structures. In this article, we systematically investigate the energy gain of this cooperative wrapping by minimizing the energies of the rotationally symmetric shapes of the membrane tubes and of membrane segments wrapping single particles. We find that the energy gain for the cooperative wrapping of nanoparticles in membrane tubes relative to their individual wrapping as single particles strongly depends on the ratio rho/R of the particle radius R and the range rho of the particle-membrane adhesion potential. For a potential range of the order of one nanometer, the cooperative wrapping in tubes is highly favorable for particles with a radius of tens of nanometers and intermediate adhesion energies, but not for particles that are significantly larger.
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