Modeling and optimization of Blumlein nanosecond pulse generator for experiments on planar lipid bilayers

摘要

Although electroporation protocols are common in biomedicine and biotechnology, the fundamental molecular-scale mechanisms involved in electroporation are still not completely understood. Therefore, molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of small patches of planar lipid bilayers (PLB) and experimentally formed PLB are used to model the cell membrane and to explain the electroporation process. However, in addition to the size difference, there is also a significant time gap between this two modeling methods. MD simulates processes up to nanoseconds while experimentally formed PLB are used to detect microsecond processes. In the presented work we model and optimize Blumlein nanosecond generator with pulse forming networks (PFN) for application of nanosecond pulses on PLB, where PLB chamber electrically represents low conductance and high capacitance. Blumlein nanosecond generator with PFN is suitable for adjusting the impedance of the generator to the impedance of the load. The challenge of generating nanosecond pulses on PLB can be addressed with careful designing of the pulse generator architecture and selecting appropriate electrical components. Numerical approaches, such as SPICE, can be a great help during development of pulse generators by either verification of its configuration or defining values of electrical components in order to obtain desired pulse characteristics.