Lipid-Protein Membrane Structure-Function Characterization using Droplet Interface Bilayers

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10:27 min

June 12th, 2026

461 views

Peter T. Podar¹^,² , Ariana Adkisson-Washington²^,³ , Olivia Ziemer²^,⁴ , Victoria Sullivan²^,⁵ , Christian Milem²^,⁶ , Janine Hagar-Montoya²^,⁷ , Shriya Khule²^,⁸ , Zachary Griffith²^,⁹ , Khalid Tantawi²^,¹⁰ , Xiuhong Zhai²^,¹¹ , Dima Bolmatov¹² , John Katsaras²^,¹¹ , Charles Patrick Collier¹³

¹Carle Illinois College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, ²Shull Wollan Center, University of Tennessee, ³Department of Chemistry, Louisiana State University, ⁴Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tennessee, ⁵Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Tennessee, ⁶Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of Cincinnati, ⁷Department of Metallurgical, Materials, and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas at El Paso, ⁸Farragut High School, ⁹Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Alabama, ¹⁰Department of Engineering Management and Technology, University of Tennessee, ¹¹Labs and Soft Matter Group, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, ¹²Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas Tech University, ¹³Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, Oak Ridge National Laboratory

An experimental protocol is presented to assemble, electrically stimulate, and analyze gramicidin A-doped droplet interface bilayers. Lipid-protein structure-function relationships are quantified by measuring changes in membrane area, ionic flux, and single-channel conductance, and relating these responses to plasticity-like changes in ionic conduction in a membrane model inspired by electrical synapses.