Role of Target Geometry in Endocytosis: Laying Down to Stand Up
Sulin Zhang (Penn State University), Changjin Huang (The Pennsylvania State Univers), Yao Zhang (The Pennsylvania State Univers)
Computational Mechanics of Biomembranes
Mon 9:00 - 10:30
Barus-Holley 160
Nanoparticles (NPs) hold great promise for highly effective and targeted disease diagnosis and therapy. Despite considerable progress in synthesis, surface functionalization, and bioconjugation of nanoparticles (NPs) as drug delivery carriers and diagnostic biomarkers, the role of NP size and shape in endocytosis has remained unclear. Using a highly efficient coarse-grained model, we studied receptor-mediated endocytosis of NP of various sizes and shapes. Our simulations demonstrate that NP size encodes the maximal membrane bending energy that determines the completion of endocytosis, while NP shape encodes NP-membrane interaction energy landscape and hence regulating the endocytic pathway and the angle of entry. The findings shed light on the design of NP-based bioagents for cancer diagnosis and chemotherapy.