The Structuring Role of Water in Bio-Interfaces

这个博士项目将打破常见的范式，专注于承压水的基本性质，其结构与功能的关系，仿生膜系统。生物界面，如在脂质自组装中发现的那些，是细胞生命中的重要组成部分，允许构建各种生物膜，包括平面质膜、管状细胞与细胞连接或双连续鞍状界面，以增强生物催化。为了理解这些组件的纳米结构，已经进行了大量的结构研究-并且仍然是-主要应用X射线和中子散射以及使用光学和电子显微镜。尽管如此，水的结构化作用是广泛未研究的，大多数情况下只考虑散装水的性质，虽然水出现在不同的秩序状态，当结构化生物界面，并因此，影响它们的结构和机械性能。该项目旨在阐明这一主题，识别绑定，扰动和自由界面水在脂质自组装约束，从而解决许多仍然悬而未决的问题，如水化力，水集群，堆叠注册表效应和界面波动行为。基本的工作假设是，生物界面中的水和脂质基质之间的相互作用导致两种组分（脂质和水）的结构性相互印迹，因此它们应被解释为一个不可分割的单元，以实现对生物膜基质的更深入理解。

This PhD-project will break with common paradigms and focuses on fundamental properties of confined water in its structure-to-function relationship to biomimetic membrane systems. Bio-interfaces such as those being found in lipid self-assemblies are important components in cell-life allowing the construction of various biomembranes including the planar plasma membrane, tubular cell-to-cell connections or bicontinuous saddle-like interfaces to enhance bio-catalysis. Vast amount of structural studies have been carried out - and still are - for understanding the nanostructure of these assemblies mainly applying X-ray and neutron scattering as well as using light and electron microscopy. Nonetheless, the structuring role of water is widely unstudied and mostly only the bulk water properties are considered, although water appears in different states of order, when structuring bio-interfaces, and as a consequence, influencing the structural and mechanical properties of them. This project aims to shed light onto this topic discerning bound, perturbed and free interfacial water in lipid self-assembled confinements and hereby tackling many still open questions such as hydration forces, water clustering, stacking registry effects and interfacial undulation behaviour. The underlying working hypothesis is that the interplay between the water and lipid matrix in biointerfaces leads to structural, reciprocal imprinting in both components (lipid and water), and they should therefore be interpreted as one inseparable unit in order to achieve a deeper understanding of the biomembrane matrix.