John C. Mathai

Structural Determinants of Water Permeability through the Lipid Membrane

Despite intense study over many years, the mechanisms by which water and small nonelectrolytes cross lipid bilayers remain unclear. While prior studies of permeability through membranes have focused on solute characteristics, such as size, polarity, and partition coefficient in hydrophobic solvent, we focus here on water permeability in seven single component bilayers composed of different lipids, five with phosphatidylcholine headgroups and different chain lengths and unsaturation, one with a phosphatidylserine headgroup, and one with a phosphatidylethanolamine headgroup. We find that water permeability correlates most strongly with the area/lipid and is poorly correlated with bilayer thickness and other previously determined structural and mechanical properties of these single component bilayers. These results suggest a new model for permeability that is developed in the accompanying theoretical paper in which the area occupied by the lipid is the major determinant and the hydrocarbon thickness is a secondary determinant. Cholesterol was also incorporated into DOPC bilayers and X-ray diffuse scattering was used to determine quantitative structure with the result that the area occupied by DOPC in the membrane decreases while bilayer thickness increases in a correlated way because lipid volume does not change. The water permeability decreases with added cholesterol and it correlates in a different way from pure lipids with area per lipid, bilayer thickness, and also with area compressibility.

No facilitator required for membrane transport of hydrogen sulfide

Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) has emerged as a new and important member in the group of gaseous signaling molecules. However, the molecular transport mechanism has not yet been identified. Because of structural similarities with H2O, it was hypothesized that aquaporins may facilitate H2S transport across cell membranes. We tested this hypothesis by reconstituting the archeal aquaporin AfAQP from sulfide reducing bacteria Archaeoglobus fulgidus into planar membranes and by monitoring the resulting facilitation of osmotic water flow and H2S flux. To measure H2O and H2S fluxes, respectively, sodium ion dilution and buffer acidification by proton release (H2S ⇆ H+ + HS−) were recorded in the immediate membrane vicinity. Both sodium ion concentration and pH were measured by scanning ion-selective microelectrodes. A lower limit of lipid bilayer permeability to H2S, PM,H2S ≥ 0.5 ± 0.4 cm/s was calculated by numerically solving the complete system of differential reaction diffusion equations and fitting the theoretical pH distribution to experimental pH profiles. Even though reconstitution of AfAQP significantly increased water permeability through planar lipid bilayers, PM,H2S remained unchanged. These results indicate that lipid membranes may well act as a barrier to water transport although they do not oppose a significant resistance to H2S diffusion. The fact that cholesterol and sphingomyelin reconstitution did not turn these membranes into an H2S barrier indicates that H2S transport through epithelial barriers, endothelial barriers, and membrane rafts also occurs by simple diffusion and does not require facilitation by membrane channels.

Carbon Dioxide Transport through Membranes

Several membrane channels, like aquaporin-1 (AQP1) and the RhAG protein of the rhesus complex, were hypothesized to be of physiological relevance for CO2 transport. However, the underlying assumption that the lipid matrix imposes a significant barrier to CO2 diffusion was never confirmed experimentally. Here we have monitored transmembrane CO2 flux (JCO2) by imposing a CO2 concentration gradient across planar lipid bilayers and detecting the resulting small pH shift in the immediate membrane vicinity. An analytical model, which accounts for the presence of both carbonic anhydrase and buffer molecules, was fitted to the experimental pH profiles using inverse problems techniques. At pH 7.4, the model revealed that JCO2 was entirely rate-limited by near-membrane unstirred layers (USL), which act as diffusional barriers in series with the membrane. Membrane tightening by sphingomyelin and cholesterol did not alter JCO2 confirming that membrane resistance was comparatively small. In contrast, a pH-induced shift of the CO2 hydration-dehydration equilibrium resulted in a relative membrane contribution of about 15% to the total resistance (pH 9.6). Under these conditions, a membrane CO2 permeability (3.2 ± 1.6 cm/s) was estimated. It indicates that cellular CO2 uptake (pH 7.4) is always USL-limited, because the USL size always exceeds 1 μm. Consequently, facilitation of CO2 transport by AQP1, RhAG, or any other protein is highly unlikely. The conclusion was confirmed by the observation that CO2 permeability of epithelial cell monolayers was always the same whether AQP1 was overexpressed in both the apical and basolateral membranes or not.

Functional Analysis of Aquaporin-1 Deficient Red Cells THE COLTON-NULL PHENOTYPE

The aquaporin-1 (AQP1) water transport protein contains a polymorphism corresponding to the Colton red blood cell antigens. To define the fraction of membrane water permeability mediated by AQP1, red cells were obtained from human kindreds with the rare Colton-null phenotype. Homozygosity or heterozygosity for deletion of exon I in AQP1 correlated with total or partial deficiency of AQP1 protein. Homozygote red cell morphology appeared normal, but clinical laboratory studies revealed slightly reduced red cell life span in vivo; deformability studies revealed a slight reduction in membrane surface area. Diffusional water permeability (P) was measured under isotonic conditions by pulsed field gradient NMR. Osmotic water permeability (P) was measured by change in light scattering after rapid exposure of red cells to increased extracellular osmolality. AQP1 contributes 64% (P = 1.5 × 10 cm/s) of the total diffusional water permeability pathway, and lipid permeation apparently comprises 23%. In contrast, AQP1 contributes >85% (P = 19 × 10 cm/s) of the total osmotic water permeability pathway, and lipid permeation apparently comprises only 10%. The ratio of AQP1-mediated P to P predicts the length of the aqueous pore to be 36 Å.

Theory of Passive Permeability through Lipid Bilayers

Recently measured water permeability through bilayers of different lipids is most strongly correlated with the area per lipid A rather than with other structural quantities such as the thickness. This paper presents a simple three-layer theory that incorporates the area dependence in a physically realistic way and also includes the thickness as a secondary modulating parameter. The theory also includes the well-known strong correlation of permeability upon the partition coefficients of general solutes in hydrocarbon environments (Overtons rule). Two mathematical treatments of the theory are given; one model uses discrete chemical kinetics and one model uses the Nernst-Planck continuum equation. The theory is fit to the recent experiments on water permeability in the accompanying paper.

Structure and water permeability of fully hydrated diphytanoylPC

Diphytanoylphosphatidylcholine (DPhyPC) is a branched chain lipid often used for model membrane studies, including peptide/lipid interactions, ion channels and lipid rafts. This work reports results of volume measurements, water permeability measurements P(f), X-ray scattering from oriented samples, and X-ray and neutron scattering from unilamellar vesicles at T=30 degrees C. We measured the volume/lipid V(L)=1426+/-1A(3). The area/lipid was found to be 80.5+/-1.5A(2) when both X-ray and neutron data were combined with the SDP model analysis (Kucerka, N., Nagle, J.F., Sachs, J.N., Feller, S.E., Pencer, J., Jackson, A., Katsaras, J., 2008. Lipid bilayer structure determined by the simultaneous analysis of neutron and X-ray scattering data. Biophys. J. 95, 2356-2367); this is substantially larger than the area of DOPC which has the largest area of the common linear chain lipids. P(f) was measured to be (7.0+/-1.0)x10(-3)cm/s; this is considerably smaller than predicted by the recently proposed 3-slab model (Nagle, J.F., Mathai, J.C., Zeidel, M.L., Tristram-Nagle, S., 2008. Theory of passive permeability through lipid bilayers. J. Gen. Physiol. 131, 77-85). This disagreement can be understood if there is a diminished diffusion coefficient in the hydrocarbon core of DPhyPC and that is supported by previous molecular dynamics simulations (Shinoda, W., Mikami, M., Baba, T., Hato, M., 2004. Molecular dynamics study on the effects of chain branching on the physical properties of lipid bilayers. 2. Permeability. J. Phys. Chem. B 108, 9346-9356). While the DPhyPC head-head thickness (D(HH)=36.4A), and Hamaker parameter (H=4.5x10(-21)J) were similar to the linear chain lipid DOPC, the bending modulus (K(C)=5.2+/-0.5x10(-21)J) was 30% smaller. Our results suggest that, from the biophysical perspective, DPhyPC belongs to a different family of lipids than phosphatidylcholines that have linear chain hydrocarbon chains.

Conditional Osmotic Stress in Yeast A SYSTEM TO STUDY TRANSPORT THROUGH AQUAGLYCEROPORINS AND OSMOSTRESS SIGNALING

The accumulation and transport of solutes are hallmarks of osmoadaptation. In this study we have employed the inability of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae gpd1Δ gpd2Δ mutant both to produce glycerol and to adapt to high osmolarity to study solute transport through aquaglyceroporins and the control of osmostress-induced signaling. High levels of different polyols, including glycerol, inhibited growth of the gpd1Δ gpd2Δ mutant. This growth inhibition was suppressed by expression of the hyperactive allele Fps1-Δ1 of the osmogated yeast aquaglyceroporin, Fps1. The degree of suppression correlated with the relative rate of transport of the different polyols tested. Transport studies in secretory vesicles confirmed that Fps1-Δ1 transports polyols at increased rates compared with wild type Fps1. Importantly, wild type Fps1 and Fps1-Δ1 showed similarly low permeability for water. The growth defect on polyols in the gpd1Δ gpd2Δ mutant was also suppressed by expression of a heterologous aquaglyceroporin, rat AQP9. We surmised that this suppression was due to polyol influx, causing the cells to passively adapt to the stress. Indeed, when aquaglyceroporin-expressing gpd1Δ gpd2Δ mutants were treated with glycerol, xylitol, or sorbitol, the osmosensing HOG pathway was activated, and the period of activation correlated with the apparent rate of polyol uptake. This observation supports the notion that deactivation of the HOG pathway is closely coupled to osmotic adaptation. Taken together, our “conditional” osmotic stress system facilitates studies on aquaglyceroporin function and reveals features of the osmosensing and signaling system.

Functional analyses of aquaporin water channel proteins.

Abstract This article summarizes methods for the chemical synthesis and biophysical characterization of gramicidins with varying sequences and labels. The family of gramicidin channels has developed into a powerful model system for understanding fundamental properties, interactions, and dynamics of proteins and lipids generally, and ion channels specifically, in biological membranes.

Salt Tolerance of Archaeal Extremely Halophilic Lipid Membranes

The membranes of extremely halophilic Archaea are characterized by the abundance of a diacidic phospholipid, archaetidylglycerol methylphosphate (PGP-Me), which accounts for 50–80 mol% of the polar lipids, and by the absence of phospholipids with choline, ethanolamine, inositol, and serine head groups. These membranes are stable in concentrated 3–5 m NaCl solutions, whereas membranes of non-halophilic Archaea, which do not contain PGP-Me, are unstable and leaky under such conditions. By x-ray diffraction and vesicle permeability measurements, we demonstrate that PGP-Me contributes in an essential way to membrane stability in hypersaline environments. Large unilamellar vesicles (LUV) prepared from the polar lipids of extreme halophiles, Halobacterium halobium and Halobacterium salinarum, retain entrapped carboxyfluorescein and resist aggregation in the whole range 0–4 m NaCl, similarly to LUV prepared from purified PGP-Me. By contrast, LUV made of polar lipid extracts from moderately halophilic and non-halophilic Archaea (Methanococcus jannaschii, Methanosarcina mazei, Methanobrevibacter smithii) are leaky and aggregate at high salt concentrations. However, adding PGP-Me to M. mazei lipids results in gradual enhancement of LUV stability, correlating with the PGP-Me content. The LUV data are substantiated by the x-ray results, which show that H. halobium and M. mazei lipids have dissimilar phase behavior and form different structures at high NaCl concentrations. H. halobium lipids maintain an expanded lamellar structure with spacing of 8.5–9 nm, which is stable up to at least 100 °C in 2 m NaCl and up to ∼60 °C in 4 m NaCl. However, M. mazei lipids form non-lamellar structures, represented by the Pn3m cubic phase and the inverted hexagonal HII phase. From these data, the forces preventing membrane aggregation in halophilic Archaea appear to be steric repulsion, because of the large head group of PGP-Me, or possibly out-of-plane bilayer undulations, rather than electrostatic repulsion attributed to the doubly charged PGP-Me head group.

Water and Deuterium Oxide Permeability through Aquaporin 1: MD Predictions and Experimental Verification

Determining the mechanisms of flux through protein channels requires a combination of structural data, permeability measurement, and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. To further clarify the mechanism of flux through aquaporin 1 (AQP1), osmotic pf (cm3/s/pore) and diffusion pd (cm3/s/pore) permeability coefficients per pore of H2O and D2O in AQP1 were calculated using MD simulations. We then compared the simulation results with experimental measurements of the osmotic AQP1 permeabilities of H2O and D2O. In this manner we evaluated the ability of MD simulations to predict actual flux results. For the MD simulations, the force field parameters of the D2O model were reparameterized from the TIP3P water model to reproduce the experimentally observed difference in the bulk self diffusion constants of H2O vs. D2O. Two MD systems (one for each solvent) were constructed, each containing explicit palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidyl-ethanolamine (POPE) phospholipid molecules, solvent, and AQP1. It was found that the calculated value of pf for D2O is ∼15% smaller than for H2O. Bovine AQP1 was reconstituted into palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidylcholine (POPC) liposomes, and it was found that the measured macroscopic osmotic permeability coefficient Pf (cm/s) of D2O is ∼21% lower than for H2O. The combined computational and experimental results suggest that deuterium oxide permeability through AQP1 is similar to that of water. The slightly lower observed osmotic permeability of D2O compared to H2O in AQP1 is most likely due to the lower self diffusion constant of D2O.