ArticleBiophysical journal2019
Highly Efficient Protein-free Membrane Fusion: A Giant Vesicle Study.
Article in Biophysical journal, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 45 papers.
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Who cites it
45 citing papers in PubMed, 109 citations in OpenAlex.
- Electric-field manipulation of giant vesicles: new frontiers in membrane electromechanics.European biophysics journal : EBJ · 2026Review
- Devising a divisome for synthetic cells.Nature reviews. Chemistry · 2026Review
- Flip Flop-Associated Growth and Division of Synthetic Cells.ACS nano · 2026Article
- Viral Infection-Inspired Autonomous Detection of Fusion-Competent Viruses for Screening and Environmental Surveillance.Advanced materials (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) · 2026Article
- Ion- and Temperature-Programmable Reconfiguration of Subcompartments in Synthetic Cells.Chembiochem : a European journal of chemical biology · 2026Article
- Protein-free membrane fusion: A refined view of the delicate fusogenic properties of calcium.Biophysical journal · 2026Article
- Dynamic Shape Modulation of Deflated and Adhered Lipid Vesicles.Journal of the American Chemical Society · 2025Article
- The Hidden Cost of Fusion: Intrinsic Asymmetry in Vesicle Fusion Restricts Synthetic Cell Growth.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Fusogenic lipid nanoparticles for rapid delivery of large therapeutic molecules to exosomes.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Designer artificial environments for membrane protein synthesis.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Functional reconstitution of plant plasma membrane HScientific reports · 2025Article
- Membrane Fusion-Based Drug Delivery Liposomes Transiently Modify the Material Properties of Synthetic and Biological Membranes.Small (Weinheim an der Bergstrasse, Germany) · 2025Article
- Invagination of Giant Unilamellar Vesicles upon Membrane Mixing with Native Vesicles.ACS omega · 2024Article
- Emerging Designs and Applications for Biomembrane Biosensors.Annual review of analytical chemistry (Palo Alto, Calif.) · 2024Review
- Fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy of flexible and rigid dyes probes the biophysical properties of synthetic and biological membranes.Biophysical journal · 2024Article
- The local variation of the Gaussian modulus enables different pathways for fluid lipid vesicle fusion.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- SecYEG-mediated translocation in a model synthetic cell.Synthetic biology (Oxford, England) · 2024Article
- A supramolecular system mimicking the infection process of an enveloped virus through membrane fusion.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Photomanipulation of Minimal Synthetic Cells: Area Increase, Softening, and Interleaflet Coupling of Membrane Models Doped with Azobenzene-Lipid Photoswitches.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2023Article
- Interleaflet organization of membrane nanodomains: What can(not) be resolved by FRET?Biophysical journal · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Membrane fusion is a ubiquitous process in biology and is a prerequisite for many intracellular delivery protocols relying on the use of liposomes as drug carriers. Here, we investigate in detail the process of membrane fusion and the role of opposite charges in a protein-free lipid system based on cationic liposomes (LUVs, large unilamellar vesicles) and anionic giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) composed of different palmitoyloleoylphosphatidylcholine (POPC)/palmitoyloleoylphosphatidylglycerol (POPG) molar ratios. By using a set of optical-microscopy- and microfluidics-based methods, we show that liposomes strongly dock to GUVs of pure POPC or low POPG fraction (up to 10 mol%) in a process mainly associated with hemifusion and membrane tension increase, commonly leading to GUV rupture. On the other hand, docked LUVs quickly and very efficiently fuse with negative GUVs of POPG fractions at or above 20 mol%, resulting in dramatic GUV area increase in a charge-dependent manner; the vesicle area increase is deduced from GUV electrodeformation. Importantly, both hemifusion and full fusion are leakage-free. Fusion efficiency is quantified by the lipid transfer from liposomes to GUVs using fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET), which leads to consistent results when compared to fluorescence-lifetime-based FRET. We develop an approach to deduce the final composition of single GUVs after fusion based on the FRET efficiency. The results suggest that fusion is driven by membrane charge and appears to proceed up to charge neutralization of the acceptor GUV.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.