Open AccessVisualization and measurement of the local absorption coefficients of single bilayer phospholipid membranes using scanning near-field optical microscopy
Author(s) -
Arif M. Siddiquee,
Imad Younus Hasan,
Shibiao Wei,
Daniel Langley,
Eugeniu Balaur,
Chen Liu,
Jiao Lin,
Brian Abbey,
Ádám Mechler,
Shan Shan Kou
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
biomedical optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.362
H-Index - 86
ISSN - 2156-7085
DOI - 10.1364/boe.10.006569
Subject(s) - membrane , near field scanning optical microscope , optical microscope , microscopy , absorption (acoustics) , lipid bilayer , materials science , analytical chemistry (journal) , bilayer , phospholipid , optics , chemistry , scanning electron microscope , chromatography , biochemistry , physics , composite material
Here we report the results of shear-mode thicknesses and absorption coefficient measurements made on neat membranes using scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM). Biomimic neat membranes composed of two different types of phoshpholipid molecules: 1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DOPC) and 1,2- dipalmitoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DPPC) were found to exhibit different absorption coefficients under the SNOM. The localization of the lipids could be identified and correlated to the morphology of the membrane domains indicating that SNOM can be an effective and accurate approach for the label-free characterization of the structure-function relationships in cell membranes.