Electric Field in the Cytoplasmic Membrane as Factor for Improved Cell Metabolism

Abstract

Abstract. This work is devoted to the evolutionary development of cellular structures and role of the electric fields in the cell membrane. We showed that the main channels of transmembrane potential generation are the output from cell of hydrogen ions, appearing under utilization of energy-intensive substrates in the cytoplasm, and different rates of metabolism of lipid mass in the internal and external layers of membrane. We considered also the mechanisms of electric field generation in the hydrocarbon part of the membrane (in the region oflipid "tails") under coordinated lean of the "heads" in one layer of bilayer. According to proposed logic, Donnan potential seems not a potential of thermodynamic equilibrium and exists on the membrane due to the process of archaic metabolism in the cells. We showed also that the asymmetry of membrane permeability arisen for molecules with dipole moment and minimum cross-section at its positive and negative ends because of the presence of the electric field in the membrane. In the evolutionary process, this asymmetry determined the selection of molecules by chiral symmetry associated with the dipole moment. It explains existence in the living world only those molecules, having the same chirality with respect to their dipole moment. In the experiment with erythrocytes we found that the stronger electric field on their membrane, the more significant redistribution of glucose molecule (having the dipole moment and minimal cross-section at the positive end of dipole) between plasma and cytoplasm in favor of the last. In the experiments with erythrocytes, we also revealed predicted effect of asymmetry of permeability for water molecules, providing preservation of erythrocyte volume under oxygenation of venous blood.