Mechanism of Line Activity of Ganglioside GM1 on Liquid-Ordered Domains

Abstract

Cholesterol is known for its condensing effect on phospholipids, which was first discovered in monolayers (Leathes, 1925), i.e., a binary mixture of a phospholipid and cholesterol have an average molecular area less than the sum of the molecular areas of the two components. The corresponding effect in bilayers where the thickness of the mixture is greater than that of each component alone is also well-known (Levine and Wilkins, 1971). At the maximum solubility, cholesterol can increase the thickness of DOPC by 5.1 Å , SOPC by 5.8 Å ,