Cell-Scale Dynamic Modeling of Membrane Interactions with Arbitrarily Shaped Particles

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Redwan, Didarul Ahasan, Reicher, Justin, Yong, Xin
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Redwan, Didarul Ahasan
Reicher, Justin
Yong, Xin
author_facet Redwan, Didarul Ahasan
Reicher, Justin
Yong, Xin
contents Modeling membrane interactions with arbitrarily shaped colloidal particles, such as environmental micro- and nanoplastics, at the cell scale remains particularly challenging, owing to the complexity of particle geometries and the need to resolve fully coupled translational and rotational dynamics. Here, we present a force-based computational framework capable of capturing dynamic interactions between deformable lipid vesicles and rigid particles of irregular shapes. Both vesicle and particle surfaces are represented using triangulated meshes, and Langevin dynamics resolves membrane deformation alongside rigid-body particle motion. Adhesive interactions between the particle and membrane surfaces are modeled using two numerical schemes: a vertex-to-vertex mapping and a vertex-to-surface projection. The latter yields more accurate wrapping energetics, as demonstrated by benchmark comparisons against ideal spheres. The dynamic simulations reveal that lower particle-to-vesicle mass ratios facilitate frequent particle reorientation and complete membrane wrapping, while higher mass ratios limit orientation changes and stabilize partial wrapping. To illustrate the framework's versatility, we simulate interactions involving cubical, rod-like, bowl-shaped, and tetrahedral particles with spherical, cigar-shaped, or biconcave vesicles. This generalizable modeling approach enables predictive, cell-scale studies of membrane-particle interactions across a wide range of geometries, with applications in environmental biophysics and nanomedicine.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_02376
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Cell-Scale Dynamic Modeling of Membrane Interactions with Arbitrarily Shaped Particles
Redwan, Didarul Ahasan
Reicher, Justin
Yong, Xin
Soft Condensed Matter
Biological Physics
Modeling membrane interactions with arbitrarily shaped colloidal particles, such as environmental micro- and nanoplastics, at the cell scale remains particularly challenging, owing to the complexity of particle geometries and the need to resolve fully coupled translational and rotational dynamics. Here, we present a force-based computational framework capable of capturing dynamic interactions between deformable lipid vesicles and rigid particles of irregular shapes. Both vesicle and particle surfaces are represented using triangulated meshes, and Langevin dynamics resolves membrane deformation alongside rigid-body particle motion. Adhesive interactions between the particle and membrane surfaces are modeled using two numerical schemes: a vertex-to-vertex mapping and a vertex-to-surface projection. The latter yields more accurate wrapping energetics, as demonstrated by benchmark comparisons against ideal spheres. The dynamic simulations reveal that lower particle-to-vesicle mass ratios facilitate frequent particle reorientation and complete membrane wrapping, while higher mass ratios limit orientation changes and stabilize partial wrapping. To illustrate the framework's versatility, we simulate interactions involving cubical, rod-like, bowl-shaped, and tetrahedral particles with spherical, cigar-shaped, or biconcave vesicles. This generalizable modeling approach enables predictive, cell-scale studies of membrane-particle interactions across a wide range of geometries, with applications in environmental biophysics and nanomedicine.
title Cell-Scale Dynamic Modeling of Membrane Interactions with Arbitrarily Shaped Particles
topic Soft Condensed Matter
Biological Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.02376