Electric-driven membrane poration: A rationale for water role in the kinetics of pore formation

All–atom molecular dynamics simulation of the combined effects of different phospholipids and cholesterol contents on electroporation

“…At 24% cholesterol content, we can also draw a similar conclusion of that in 40% cholesterol content. H-bonds has been applied to describe the process of the models from equilibrium state to the formation of water bridges, 27,28 but the initial H-bonds was not considered. The combination of other phospholipid molecules (POPS and POPG) with cholesterol also had some influence on the H-bonds, 83 which verified our results of different initial H-bonds.…”

“…[22][23][24][25] Furthermore, some researchers found that with the movement of water molecules, the hydrogen bonds between water would change, and the network of hydrogen bonds vibrated, which affected the occurrence of electroporation. [26][27][28] The variation in hydrogen bonds between water affected the recombination of peptides on the membrane, and the association between protein peptides and cell membranes had been linked to diseases such as Alzheimer disease. [29][30][31] Most all-atom MD models used to study electroporation mechanism were based on pure phospholipid membrane models.…”

All-atom molecular dynamics simulations of the combined effects of different phospholipids and cholesterol content on electroporation

“…At 24% cholesterol content, we can also draw a similar conclusion to that with 40% cholesterol content. H-bonds have been applied to describe the process of models from an equilibrium state to the formation of water bridges, 27,28 but the initial number of H-bonds was not considered. The combination of other phospholipid molecules (persistent organic pollutants (POPS) and palmitoyloleoylphosphatidylglycerol (POPG)) with cholesterol has also been shown to have an influence on the number of H-bonds, 83 which verified our results for different initial numbers of H-bonds.…”

“…[22][23][24][25] Furthermore, some researchers found that, with the movement of water molecules, the hydrogen bonds between the water molecules would change, and the network of hydrogen bonds would vibrate, which affected the occurrence of electroporation. [26][27][28] The variation in hydrogen bonds between the water molecules affected the recombination of peptides on the membrane, and the association between protein peptides and cell membranes has been linked to diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease. [29][30][31] Most all-atom MD models used to study the electroporation mechanism were based on pure phospholipid membrane models.…”

Electric field bridging-effect in electrified microfibrils’ scaffolds

“…In this context, an innovative initiative has been proposed within the European project RISEUP 1 that can combine electric stimulation with neurogenesis to be supported by a biocompatible microfibril's scaffold. The project aims at the regeneration of the injured spinal cord through the development of an implantable electro pulsed biohybrid (EPB) device that supports and guides the differentiation of human induced neural stem cells (iNSCs) combined with mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) (Caramazza et al, 2021a; through a highly intense and ultrashort pulsed electric field, as intense as those used in electroporationbased technologies (Breton and Mir, 2012;Kotnik et al, 2019;Caramazza et al, 2020a;Caramazza, et al, 2021b;Marracino et al, 2021), and direct current (DC) stimulation protocols to guide cell migration (Dong et al, 2019;Caramazza, et al, 2020b;Naskar et al, 2020), to generate a biohybrid cell bridge on the lesion. From a technological point of view, the EPB device is represented by a set of interdigitated alternating active and ground planar electrodes, to provide DC or pulsed electric fields with 100 µs duration (µsPEFs) stimulation, on which a biocompatible microfibril-based scaffold will be posed to host the target cells.…”