title: Properties of ionic transport through phospholipid-glycolipid artificial bilayers.
abstract: The ionic transport properties of dioleoylphosphatidylcholine (DOPC) membranes containing various sphingolipids were studied. Particular attention was paid to membranes formed from beta-D-glucosylceramide (GlcCer) and DOPC. They showed a marked increase in ionic permeability (up to a factor 30 with respect to pure DOPC membranes), slight cation selectivity and almost linear behaviour of the current-voltage characteristic. Bilayers containing GlcCer showed a typical conductance decrease upon increasing the temperature. We suggest the formation of clusters containing GlcCer molecules in a solid-crystalline phase. The conductance increase might be due to ionic pathways through disordered boundary regions. An increase in the mechanical breakdown potential was observed in all membranes which contain sphingolipids.
mesh_terms: D004553:Electric Conductivity; D006017:Glycolipids; D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D008564:Membrane Potentials; D010713:Phosphatidylcholines; D010743:Phospholipids; D013107:Sphingolipids; D013329:Structure-Activity Relationship
chemical_list: D006017:Glycolipids; D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D010713:Phosphatidylcholines; D010743:Phospholipids; D013107:Sphingolipids; C017251:1,2-oleoylphosphatidylcholine