Bilayer phases

Work by Mario Orsi at the University of Southampton. LAMMPS was used together with the ELBA-LAMMPS toolkit to simulate simple models of biological membranes. Notably, depth-dependent lateral pressure and electrical potential profiles were computed for mixed PC/PE bilayers at different relative compositions.

The images show a sketch of the molecular models, a series of snapshots from a self-assembly simulation of a lamellar structure, and a series of snapshots from a simulation of a spontaneous phase transition from lamellar to inverse hexagonal.