Membrane-Bound Water is Energetically Decoupled from Nearby Bulk Water: An Ultrafast Surface-Specific Investigation

摘要

The driving force behind a number of entropically unfavorable biophysical processes, such as protein folding, membrane formation, and cellular transport, has been attributed to the orientation and structuring of water molecules in the vicinity of biomolecules. Membrane-bound water is of particular interest, as the functionality of lipid membranes is known to be intrinsically linked to hydration, and hydration of lipids has important structural and functional consequences for the membrane. The hydration dynamics and the water-lipid interaction strength are, for instance, closely related to the membrane fluidity and the molecular organization of the lipids.