Investigating the Cell Membrane via Single Particle Tracking, Bayesian Inference and Hydrodynamic Force Application

Abstract : We investigate the potential felt by membrane receptors inside membrane microdomains via tracking of single receptors labelled with rare-earth doped luminescent nanoparticles and Bayesian inference analysis of the recorded trajectories. We demonstrated that the potential felt by peptidic toxin receptors confined in lipid rafts is well described by a second-order polynomial potential, possibly due to an inhomogeneous lipid and protein distribution [Türkcan et al., Biophys. J. 2012] In contrast, the potential experienced by transferrin receptors in cytoskeleton-delimited microdomains is localized at the border of the confinement domain.