Dedicated to Prof. Raymond U. Lemieux on the occasion of his 60th birthday ROBERT J. CUSHLEY, HEINERGORRISSEN, and STEPHEN R. WASSALL. Can. J. Chem. 58,2433Chem. 58, (1980. Cholesteryl palmitate (CP) has been incorporated into vesicles of dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine and dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine/20 mol% cholesterol, in amounts up to 5 mol%. By means of 3'P lanthanide induced shifts the average diameter of these vesicles was calculated to be -270 A.The 2H spectral linewidths of selectively deuterated CP incorporated into liquid crystalline dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine vesicles are S 150 Hz, implying a low degree of order for the ester acyl chain. Addition of 20 mol% cholesterol to the vesicles increases the linewidths which, nevertheless, remain 5 185 Hz. The corresponding 2H longitudinal relaxation times (1450 ms) indicate that the fast segmental motions of the ester chain are slower than for the phospholipid chains.ROBERT J. CUSHLEY, HEINER GORRISSEN et STEPHEN R. WASSALL. Can. J. Chem. 58,2433Chem. 58, (1980. On a incorpore le palmitate de cholesteryle (PC) en quantite allant jusqu'i 5 mol% dans les vesicules de dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine et de dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine/20 mol% cholesterol. Au moyen des deplacements chimiques du )'P induits par les lanthanides on a calculk que le diambtre moyen de ces vesicules est d'environ 270 A. Les largeurs des raies des spectres rmn 2H des PC deuteres selectivement et incorpores dans les vCsicules de dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine cristallins B I'etat liquide sont S 150 Hz; ceci implique un faible degre d'ordre de la chaine ester acyc1ique.L'addition de 20 mol% de cholest6rol aux vesicules augmente la largeur des raies qui nkanmoins restent i 185 Hz. Les temps de relaxation longitudinale correspondants du 2H (2450 ms) indiquent que les rapides mouvements des segments de la chaine ester sont plus lents que ceux des chaines phospholipides.[Traduit par le journal] Introduction the phospholipid is changed from phosphatidylWe have been studying the structure and proper-choline to sphingomyelin the amount of interties of cholesteryl esters in various phospholipid calated CP reaches 1.5 mol% (7). membrane systems using a diversity of magnetic When eggphosphatidylcholine bilayers are made resonance techniques. In our initial study (1) we by sonication of aqueous dispersions to form highly utilized 31P nmr spectroscopy and found that curved unilamellar vesicles, ester intercalation incholesteryl palmitate (CP) increased the permea-creases substantially, reaching as high as 5 mol% bility of model membranes to ions, whereas (6) while the ester chains appear more disordered cholesteryl linoleate did not. The behavior of the compared to CP in multilamellar liposomes (5). saturated ester CP in egg phosphatidylcholineThe present study is an attempt to determine the bilayer systems was studied by epr of spin-labeled behavior of saturated cholesteryl ester in a highly CP in multilayers (2, 3), as well as 13C nmr differ-curved bilayer composed of the completely satuenc...