We have developed a strategy for preparing tethered lipid bilayer membrane patches on solid surfaces by DNA hybridization. In this way, the tethered membrane patch is held at a controllable distance from the surface by varying the length of the DNA used. Two basic strategies are described. In the first, single-stranded DNA strands are immobilized by click chemistry to a silica surface, whose remaining surface is passivated to prevent direct assembly of a solid supported bilayer. Then giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) displaying the antisense strand, using a DNA-lipid conjugate developed in earlier work (Chan, Lengerich et al. 2008), are allowed to tether, spread and rupture to form tethered bilayer patches. In the second, a supported lipid bilayer displaying DNA using the DNA-lipid conjugate is first assembled on the surface. Then GUVs displaying the antisense strand are allowed to tether, spread and rupture to form tethered bilayer patches. The essential difference between these methods is that the tethering hybrid DNA is immobile in the first, while it is mobile in the second. Both strategies are successful; however, with mobile DNA hybrids as tethers, the patches are unstable, while in the first strategy stable patches can be formed. In the case of mobile tethers, if different length DNA hybrids are present, lateral segregation by length occurs and can be visualized by fluorescence interference contrast microscopy making this an interesting model for interactions that occur in cell junctions. In both cases, lipid mobility is high and there is a negligible immobile fraction. Thus, these architectures offer a flexible platform for the assembly of lipid bilayers at a well-defined distance from a solid support. KeywordsTethered lipid membrane; surface-immobilized DNA; Giant unilamellar vesicles Supported lipid bilayers (SLBs) have been widely used as a model for cell membranes (Sackmann 1996;Chan and Boxer 2007) and to investigate membrane components including proteins in a simpler context apart from the complex cellular environment. SLBs are assembled by Langmuir-Blodgett techniques or spontaneous fusion of unilamellar vesicles on carefully prepared surfaces, usually hydrophilic solid supports, such as glass (Seu, Pandey et al. 2007), silica, mica (Richter, Berat et al. 2006), or TiO 2 (Rossetti, Bally et al. 2005). Although SLBs have the advantages of simple formation, easy handling and are well-suited for investigation by a suite of surface sensitive methods due to their planar geometry, the close proximity of the lower leaflet to the solid support often leads to unfavorable interactions with integral membrane proteins. Recognizing this limitation, many groups have described methods to separate the © 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. *Corresponding Author: Tel.: 1-650-723-4482; Fax: 1-650-723-4817; E-mail: sboxer@stanford.edu. Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early versi...

Synaptic transmission is achieved by exocytosis of small, synaptic vesicles containing neurotransmitters across the plasma membrane. Here, we use a DNA-tethered freestanding bilayer as a target architecture that allows observation of content transfer of individual vesicles across the tethered planar bilayer. Tethering and fusion are mediated by hybridization of complementary DNA-lipid conjugates inserted into the two membranes, and content transfer is monitored by the dequenching of an aqueous content dye. By analyzing the diffusion profile of the aqueous dye after vesicle fusion, we are able to distinguish content transfer across the tethered bilayer patch from vesicle leakage above the patch.

We recently described a strategy to prepare DNA-tethered lipid membranes either to fixed DNA on a surface or to DNA displayed on a supported bilayer1, 2. With the latter system the DNA hybrids are laterally mobile; when orthogonal sense-antisense pairs of different lengths are used, the DNA hybrids segregate by height and the tethered membrane deforms to accommodate the height difference. This architecture is particularly useful for modelling interactions between membranes mediated by molecular recognition and resembles cell-to-cell junctions. The length, affinity and population of DNA hybrids between membranes are completely controllable. Interesting patterns of height segregation are observed by fluorescence interference contrast microscopy. Diverse behavior is observed in the segregation and pattern forming process and possible mechanisms are discussed. This model system captures some of the essential physics of synapse formation and is a step towards understanding lipid membrane behaviour in a cell-to-cell junction.

Microfluidic design has advanced existing protein separation capabilities and supported novel assays. Key metrics for successful protein separations include fast, robust, and sensitive analysis of complex mixtures of bio-macromolecules. Attaining high separation resolution is a chief concern. Here we review recent advances in polymer-based electrophoresis sieving materials that are impacting microfluidic bioanalytical applications. Looking forward, we comment on unmet needs for advanced separation media in microto-nanoscale devices.

We recently introduced two approaches for tethering planar lipid bilayers as membrane patches to either a supported lipid bilayer or DNA-functionalized surface using DNA hybridization (Chung, M., Lowe, R. D., Chan, Y-H. M., Ganesan, P. V., Boxer, S. G. J. Struct. Biol. 2009, 168, 190–9). When mobile DNA tethers are used, the tethered bilayer patches become unstable, while they are stable if the tethers are fixed on the surface. Because the mobile tethers between a patch and a supported lipid bilayer offer a particularly interesting architecture for studying the dynamics of membrane-membrane interactions, we have investigated the sources of instability, focusing on membrane composition. The most stable patches were made with a mixture of saturated lipids and cholesterol, suggesting an important role for membrane stiffness. Other factors such as the effect of tether length, lateral mobility and patch membrane edge were also investigated. Based on these results, a model for the mechanism of patch destruction is developed.