Measured effects of diacylglycerol on structural and elastic properties of phospholipid membranes.

Diacylglycerol, a biological membrane second messenger, is a strong perturber of phospholipid planar bilayers. It converts multibilayers to the reverse hexagonal phase (HII), composed of highly curved monolayers. We have used x-ray diffraction and osmotic stress of the HII phase to measure structural dimensions, spontaneous curvature, and bending moduli of dioleoylphosphatidylethanolamine (DOPE) monolayers doped with increasing amounts of dioleoylglycerol (DOG). The diameter of the HII phase cylinders equilibrated in excess water decreases significantly with increasing DOG content. Remarkably, however, all structural dimensions at any specific water/lipid ratio that is less than full hydration are insensitive to DOG. By plotting structural parameters of the HII phase with changing water content in a newly defined coordinate system, we show that the elastic deformation of the lipid monolayers can be described as bending around a pivotal plane of constant area. This dividing surface includes 30% of the lipid volume independent of the DOG content (polar heads and a small fraction of hydrocarbon chains). As the mole fraction of DOG increases to 0.3, the radius of spontaneous curvature defined for the pivotal surface decreases from 29 A to 19 A, and the bending modulus increases from approximately 11 to 14 (+/-0.5) kT. We derive the conversion factors and estimate the spontaneous curvatures and bending moduli for the neutral surface which, unlike the pivotal plane parameters, are intrinsic properties that apply to other deformations and geometries. The spontaneous curvature of the neutral surface differs from that of the pivotal plane by less than 10%, but the difference in the bending moduli is up to 40%. Our estimate shows that the neutral surface bending modulus is approximately 9kT and practically does not depend on the DOG content.

Structural dimensions and their changes in a reentrant hexagonal-lamellar transition of phospholipids.

A hexagonal-lamellar-hexagonal (HII-L-HII) reentrant phase transition sequence on dehydration of dioleoylphosphatidylethanolamine occurs below 22 degrees C. This provides an unusual opportunity to measure how several structural dimensions change during this transition. Using x-ray diffraction, we have measured these dimensions with a hope of gaining some clue about the accompanying internal stresses. The principal dimensions described are molecular areas and molecular lengths projected onto the hexagonal lattice. In contrast with large changes in average area at the polar and hydrocarbon ends of the molecule, a position near the polar group/hydrocarbon interface is one of constant molecular area. It remains constant both as the monolayers curl from changing water content and in the transition from one structure to the other. In the L-to-HII transition, the most obvious change in molecular length is a 25% decrease in the distance between aqueous cylinders, the interaxial direction. There is little change in the interstitial direction, the direction toward the interstice equidistant from three aqueous cylinders. As the hexagonal phase is dehydrated, a number of internal changes in molecular lengths are described. Increases in the interaxial direction are much larger than in the interstitial. Simultaneously however, hydrocarbon chain lengths decrease, and polar group lengths increase. It is likely that molecules move axially and the cylinders become longer with dehydration. These dimensions and their changes might be used in the search for a better understanding of the energetics of molecular packing, of the interpretation of spectroscopic measurements of these phases, and of the mechanics of lipid layers.

Measured change in protein solvation with substrate binding and turnover.

Osmotic stress is used to measure solvation changes that accompany the conformational changes of an active enzyme. For hexokinase both the equilibrium dissociation constant and the kinetic Michaelis-Menten constant for glucose vary linearly, and to the same extent, with the activity of water in the protein medium, as adjusted with large molecular weight (> 2000) osmolytes. The variation over the whole osmotic pressure range studied indicates that glucose binding is accompanied by the release of at least 65 +/- 10 water molecules, and this is reversed on enzyme turnover. The results indicate that near the physiological range of pressures the number may be higher. Most of this water, which behaves like an inhibitor, likely comes from the cleft which is induced to close around the substrate. Such large dehydration/rehydration reactions during turnover imply a significant contribution of solvation to the energetics of the conformational changes. Osmotic stress is a method of general applicability to probe water's contribution to functioning molecules.

Energetics of a hexagonal-lamellar-hexagonal-phase transition sequence in dioleoylphosphatidylethanolamine membranes.

The phase diagram of DOPE/water dispersions was investigated by NMR and X-ray diffraction in the water concentration range from 2 to 20 water molecules per lipid and in the temperature range from -5 to +50 degrees C. At temperatures above 22 degrees C, the dispersions form an inverse (HII) phase at all water concentrations. Below 25 degrees C, an HII phase occurs at high water concentrations, an L alpha phase is formed at intermediate water concentrations, and finally the system switches back to an HII phase at low water concentrations. The enthalpy of the L alpha-HII-phase transition is +0.3 kcal/mol as measured by differential scanning calorimetry. Using 31P and 2H NMR and X-ray diffraction, we measured the trapped water volumes in HII and L alpha phases as a function of osmotic pressure. The change of the HII-phase free energy as a function of hydration was calculated by integrating the osmotic pressure vs trapped water volume curve. The phase diagram calculated on the basis of the known enthalpy of transition and the osmotic pressure vs water volume curves is in good agreement with the measured one. The HII-L alpha-HII double-phase transition at temperatures below 22 degrees C can be shown to be a consequence of (i) the greater degree of hydration of the HII phase in excess water and (ii) the relative sensitivities with which the lamellar and hexagonal phases dehydrate with increasing osmotic pressure. These results demonstrate the usefulness of osmotic stress measurements to understand lipid-phase diagrams.

Membrane curvature, lipid segregation, and structural transitions for phospholipids under dual-solvent stress.

Amphiphiles respond both to polar and to nonpolar solvents. In this paper X-ray diffraction and osmotic stress have been used to examine the phase behavior, the structural dimensions, and the work of deforming the monolayer-lined aqueous cavities formed by mixtures of dioleoylphosphatidylethanolamine (DOPE) and dioleoylphosphatidylcholine (DOPC) as a function of the concentration of two solvents, water and tetradecane (td). In the absence of td, most PE/PC mixtures show only lamellar phases in excess water; all of these become single reverse hexagonal (HII) phases with addition of excess td. The spontaneous radius of curvature R0 of lipid monolayers, as expressed in these HII phases, is allowed by the relief of hydrocarbon chain stress by td; R0 increases with the ratio DOPC/DOPE. Mixtures with very large R0's can have water contents higher than the L alpha phases that form in the absence of td. The drive for hydration is understood in terms of the curvature energy to create large water cavities in addition to direct hydration of the polar groups. Much of the work of removing water to create hexagonal phases of radius R less than R0 goes into changing monolayer curvature rather than dehydrating polar groups. Single HII phases stressed by limited water or td show several responses. (a) The molecular area is compressed at the polar end of the molecule and expanded at the hydrocarbon ends. (b) For circularly symmetrical water cylinders, the degrees of hydrocarbon chain splaying and polar group compression are different for molecules aligned in different directions around the water cylinder. (c) A pivotal position exists along the length of the phospholipid molecule where little area change occurs as the monolayer is bent to increasing curvatures. (d) By defining R0 at the pivotal position, we find that measured energies are well fit by a quadratic bending energy, K0/2 (1/R-1/R0); the fit yields bilayer bending moduli of Kc = (1.2-1.7) X 10(-12) ergs, in good agreement with measurements from bilayer mechanics. (e) For lipid mixtures, enforced deviation of the HII monolayer from R0 is sufficiently powerful to cause demixing of the phospholipids in a way suggesting that the DOPE/DOPC ratio self-adjusts so that its R0 matches the amount of td or water available, i.e., that curvature energy is minimized.

Measurement of repulsive forces between charged phospholipid bilayers.

By using an osmotic stress technique (LeNeveu, D. M., et al. (1977) Biophys. J. 18, 209), we have measured the net repulsive force between egg lecithin bilayers containing various amounts of the charged lipids phosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylinositol. At bilayer separations greater than about 30 A, the repulsion is dominated by electrostatic forces; its variation with both bilayer separation and charge density is well described qualitatively by simple electrostatic double-layer theory. Quantitative agreement requires, however, that only about 50% of the phosphatidylglycerol polar groups be dissociated. At all charge densities, even for pure phosphatidylglycerol, and at bilayer separations less than about 30 A, the repulsion is dominated not by the electrostatic force but by a strong "hydration force" (LeNeveu, D. M., et al. (1977) Biophys. J. 18, 209). We conclude that the hydration force demands more attention than it has enjoyed hitherto in attempts to understand bilayer membrane interaction and fusion.