A hierarchy of lipid constructs for the sperm plasma membrane |
| |
Authors: | Apel-Paz Meirav Vanderlick T Kyle Chandra Neelima Doncel Gustavo F |
| |
Institution: | Department of Chemical Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA. |
| |
Abstract: | We have presented a series of lipid constructs as models of the sperm plasma membrane. We also isolated the plasma membrane from rabbit sperm cells and characterized the lipid composition. The behavior of these various membrane systems was evaluated using a vesicle leakage assay, in which surfactant (nonoxynol-9, N-9; or benzalkonium chloride, BZK) exposure induced membrane permeabilization. These studies shed light on the relative importance and significance of particular components present in the lipid constructs. In particular, a highly unsaturated phospholipid component characterized by an ether-linkage to position 1 of the glycerol backbone (as opposed to the more conventional ester linkage) as well as the presence of sulfogalactosyl ceramide were found to have an effect on the surfactant-induced leakage response. The presence of cholesterol had the greatest influence on membrane behavior. The construct series also demonstrated the ability of the surfactants studied to discriminate between different membrane systems. We found that N-9 displayed little sensitivity to membrane composition while BZK showed specific behavior with the various membrane systems. |
| |
Keywords: | Benzalkonium chloride C31G Carboxyfluorescein Cholesterol Leakage Nonoxynol-9 Phospholipids Plasma membrane Sperm (rabbit) Surfactants |
本文献已被 ScienceDirect PubMed 等数据库收录! |