Concept 7.

1 Cellular membranes are fluid mosaics of lipids and proteins

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STUDY TIP => Make visual guide

• Most abundant lipids in most membranes are phospholipids

• Amphipathic molecule: molecule that has a hydrophilic and hydrophobic region
• Phospholipid bilayer can exist as a stable boundary between two aqueous compartments
because the molecular arrangement shelters the hydrophobic trails of the phospholipids from
water while exposing the hydrophilic heads to water
• Most membrane proteins share the same feature
• Fluid mosaic model: membrane is a mosaic of proteins molecules bobbing in a fluid bilayer of
phospholipids

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 • Proteins are not randomly distributed in the membrane
• Groups of proteins are often associated in long-lasting specialized patches were they carry out
common functions
The Fluidity of Membranes
• Membranes are not static sheets of molecules locked rigidly in place
• Membrane is held together by hydrophobic interactions => weaker than covalent bonds
• Sideways movement of phospholipids => most of the lipids and some proteins can shift about
sideways
○ Very rapid
• Many membrane proteins seem to be immobile
○ Some move in a highly directed manner
○ Others simply drift
• Membrane remains fluid as temperature decreases until phospholipids settle into a closely
packed arrangement and membrane solidifies
• Kinks in the tails where double bonds are located means that unsaturated hydrocarbon tails
cannot pack together as closely as saturated hydrocarbon tails => makes membrane more fluid
• Cholesterol => different effects on membrane fluidity at different tempos
○ At 37 C (body temp of human) => cholesterol makes the membrane less fluid by
restraining phospholipid movement
○ It lowers temperature required for membrane to solidify => hinders close packing of
phospholipids
○ Fluidity buffer for the membrane => resisting changes in membrane fluidity caused by
temp. changes
• Plants have very low levels of cholesterol compared to animals => steroid lipids buffer
membrane fluidity instead

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 • Membranes must be fluid to work properly
• Extreme environments pose a change for life
Evolution of Differences in Membrane Lipid Composition
• Variations in cell membrane lipid compositions of many species appear to be evolutionary
adaptations that maintain the appropriate membrane fluidity under specific conditions
• Fishes in extreme cold environments have high proportion of unsaturated hydrocarbon tails
• Natural selection has apparently favored organisms whose mix of membrane lipids assures an
appropriate level of membrane fluidity for their environment
Membrane Proteins and Their Functions
• A membrane is a collage of different proteins => clustered into groups embedded in the fluid
matrix of the lipid bilayer
• Phospholipids form the main fabric of the membrane
• Proteins determine most of the membrane's function
• Different types of cells => different sets of membrane proteins => various membranes within a
cell have unique collection of proteins
• Integral proteins: proteins that penetrate the hydrophobic interior of the lipid bilayer
○ Transmembrane proteins: span the membrane
○ Some only extend part way
○ Some proteins have hydrophilic channels that allow the passage through the membrane
of hydrophilic substances (even water)
• Peripheral proteins: not embedded in the lipid bilayer but are loosely bound to the surface of
the membrane
• Some membrane proteins are held in place by attached to the cytoskeleton => cytoplasmic side
• The membrane is a functional mosaic as well as a structural one
• Protein CD4 on the surface of immune cells helps the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)
infect these cells leading to acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS)
• CD4 is the main HIV receptor, HIV must also bind to CCR5 on the cells of resistant individuals,
due to gene alteration, prevents the virus from entering the cells

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The Role of Membrane Carbohydrates in Cell-Cell Recognition
• Cell-cell recognition => ability to distinguish one type of neighboring cell from another is crucial
to the functioning of an organism
• Cells often recognize other cells by binding to molecules (often carb containing) on the
extracellular surface of the plasma membrane

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 extracellular surface of the plasma membrane

• Membrane carbohydrates are usually short, branched chains of fewer than 15 sugar units
• Glycolipids: membrane carbohydrates covalently bonded to lipids
• Four human blood types designated A, B, AB, and O reflect variation in the carbohydrate part
of glycoproteins on the surface of red blood cells
Synthesis and Sidedness of Membranes
• Membranes have distinct inside and outside faces
• Asymmetrical arrangement of proteins, lipids, and their associate carbohydrates in the plasma
membrane is determined as the membrane is built

How might the membrane lipid composition of a

native grass found in very warm soil around hot springs differ
from that of a native grass found in cooler soil? Explain.
=> really cool temps => more unsaturated because those fatty acids remain fluid at lower
temperatures
=> really hot temps => more saturated fatty acids so fatty acids stack more closely making the
membrane less fluid to help it stay in tact

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membrane less fluid to help it stay in tact

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Concept 7.2 Membrane structure results in selective permeability
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• Selective permeability: allows some substances to cross more easily than others
• Ability to regulate transport across cellular boundaries is essential to the cell's existence
• Form fits function => Fluid mosaic model helps explain how membranes regulate the cell's
molecular traffic
• Substances do not cross the barrier indiscrimately
The Permeability of the Lipid Bilayer
• Nonpolar molecules such as hydrocarbons, CO2, and O2 are hydrophobic, as are lipids and can
therefore dissolve in the lipid bilayer of the membrane and cross it easily
○ Don't need membrane proteins
• Hydrophobic interior of the membrane impedes direct passage through the membrane of ions
and polar molecules, which are hydrophilic
• Polar molecules such as glucose and other sugars pass only slowly through a lipid bilayer
• Lipid bilayer is only one aspect of the gatekeeper system responsible for cell's selective
permeability
Transport Proteins
• Transport proteins: function with a hydrophilic channel that certain molecules or ions use a
tunnel through the membrane
• Aquaporins: allows for the passage of water molecules through the membrane in certain cells
○ Consist of 4 identical polypeptide subunits
• Carrier proteins: hold on to their passengers and change shape in a way that shuttles them
across the membrane
○ Specific for the substance it translocate => allowing only a certain substance or small
group of similar substances to cross
• Glucose carrier protein in plasma membrane of red blood cells => rejects fructose (structural
isomer of glucose)

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Concept 7.3 Passive transport is diffusion of a substance across a
membrane with no energy investment
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• Molecules have a type of energy called thermal energy due to constant motion, as a result:
○ Diffusion: movement of particles of any substance so that they spread out into available
space
○ Each molecule moves randomly, yet diffusion of a population of molecules may be
directional
• In the absence of any other forces, a substance will diffuse from where it is more concentrated
to less concentration
• Concentrated gradient: region along which the density of a chemical substance increases or
decreases
• Diffusion => spontaneous and needs no input of energy
• Each substance diffuses down its own concentration gradient, unaffected by the concentration
gradients of other substances
• Diffusion example => uptake of oxygen by a cell performing cellular respiration
• Passive transport: diffusion of a substance across a biological membrane, requires no energy
input
○ Concentration gradient itself represents potential energy and drives diffusion

Effects of Osmosis on Water Balance

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Effects of Osmosis on Water Balance
• Pores in synthetic membrane are too small for sugar molecules to pass through but large
enough for water molecules
• Tight clustering of water molecules around hydrophilic solute molecules makes some of the
water unavailable to cross the membrane
• Solution with a higher solute concentration has a lower free water concentration
• Water diffuses across the membrane from the region of higher water concentration (lower
solute concentration) to that of lower free water concentration (higher solute concentration)
until the solute concentrations on both sides of the membrane are nearly equal
• Osmosis: movement of water across cell membranes and the balance of water between the
cell and its environment are crucial to organisms

Water Balance of Cells Without Cell Walls

• Tonicity: the ability of a surrounding solution to cause a cell to gain or lose water
○ Depends in part on its concentration of solutes that cannot cross the membrane
(nonpenetrating solutes) relative to that inside the cell
▪ If higher concentration of nonpenetrating solutes in the surrounding water =>
water will tend to leave the cell
• Isotonic: no net movement of water across the plasma membrane
○ In an isotonic environment, the volume of an animal cell is stable
• Hypertonic (hyper = more): more nonpenetrating solutes => water is lost
Cell will lose water, shrivel, and probably die => increase in salinity (saltiness) of a lake

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 ○ Cell will lose water, shrivel, and probably die => increase in salinity (saltiness) of a lake
can kill animals there => lake water can become hypertonic to animals' cells, they might
shrivel and die
• Hypotonic: less nonpenetrating solutes outside of the cell => water will enter the cell faster
than it leaves => cell will swell and lyse (burst) like an overfilled balloon
• Cell without rigid cell walls can't tolerate either excessive uptake or excessive loss of water =>
solved if the cell lives in isotonic surroundings
○ Seawater is isotonic to many marine invertebrates
• Cells of most terrestrial animals are bathed in an extracellular fluid that is isotonic to cells
• In hypertonic or hypotonic environments, organisms w/o cell walls need adaptations for:
○ Osmoregulation: control of solute concentrations and water balance
○ Example:
▪ Unicellular protist Parmecium candatum lives in pond water => hypotonic to the
cell => has a less permeable plasma membrane that slows down water and has a
contractile vacuole that pumps out excess water as fast as it enters by osmosis
▪ Bacteria + archaea live in hypersaline environments => cellular mechanisms to
balance the internal and external solute concentrations to ensure that water does
not move out of the cell
Water Balance of Cells with Cell Walls
• When a plant cell is immersed in a hypotonic solution => bathed in rainwater
• Cell wall maintains cell's water balance => plant cell swells as water enters by osmosis =>
relatively inelastic cell wall can expand only so much before it exerts a back pressure on the cell
=> turgor pressure
○ Turgor pressure: opposes further water uptake => cell becomes turgid (very firm)
• If a plant's cells and surroundings are isotonic, there is no net tendency for water to enter and
the cells become flaccid (limp) => plant wilts
• Plasmolysis: plant cell wall shrivels and its plasma membrane pulls away from the cell wall at
multiple places => walled cells of bacteria and fungi also plasmolyze in hypertonic
environments

Facilitated Diffusion: Passive Transport Aided by Proteins

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Facilitated Diffusion: Passive Transport Aided by Proteins
• Facilitated diffusion: many polar molecules and ions blocked by the lipid bilayer of membrane
diffuse passively with the help of transport proteins that span the membrane
○ Most transport proteins are specific => transport some substances but not others
• Channel proteins: provide corridors that allow specific molecules or ions to cross the
membrane
○ Ion channels: channel proteins that transport ions
▪ Gated channels: open or close in response to a stimulus (most ion channels)
□ Might be an electrical or chemical stimulus

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Concept 7.4 Active transport uses energy to move solutes against their
gradients
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• Some other transport proteins => can use energy to move solutes against their concentration
gradients
The Need for Energy in Active Transport
• Active transport: pumping a solute across a membrane against its gradient
○ All the proteins that move solutes against their concentration gradients are all carrier
proteins
○ Allows a cell to maintain internal concentrations of small solutes that differ from
concentrations in its environment
• Example:
○ An animal cell has a higher concentration of potassium ions and lower concentration of
sodium ions compared to its environment
○ Plasma membrane helps maintain this by pumping Na out of the cell and K into the cell
• ATP hydrolysis supplies the energy for most active transport
○ When ATP's terminal phosphate group is transferred directly to the transport protein =>
causes the protein to change its shape in a manner that translocates a solute bound to
the protein across the membrane
• Sodium potassium pump: exchanges Na for K across the membrane of animal cells

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How Ion Pumps Maintain Membrane Potential
• Voltage is electrical potential energy
• Cytoplasmic side of membrane is negative in charge relative to the extracellular side because of
an unequal distribution of anions and cations on the two sides
• Membrane potential: voltage across a membrane ranges from about -50 to -200 millivolts
(mV) => inside of cell is negative relative to the outside
○ Acts like a battery
• Because the inside of the cell is negative compared with the outside => membrane potential
favors the passive transport of cations into the cell and anions out of the cell
• Two forces drive the diffusion of ions across a membrane => chemical force (ion's
concentration gradient) and an electrical force (effect of membrane potential on the ion's
movement)
○ Combination of forces is called the electrochemical gradient
• Ion diffuses down its electrochemical gradient
• Example:
○ Resting nerve cell has a higher concentration of Na+ inside than outside
○ When the cell is stimulated, gated channels facilitate Na+ diffusion
○ Sodium ions then "fall" down their electrochemical gradient => driven by concentration
gradient of Na+ and by the attraction of these cations to the negative side (inside) of the
membrane
• In cases where electrical forces due to membrane potential oppose simple diffusion of an ion
down its concentration gradient => active transport may be necessary
• Sodium-potassium pump => pumps three sodium ions out of the cell for every two potassium
ions it pumps into the cell
○ Net transfer of one positive charge from the cytoplasm to the extracellular fluid =>
process that stores energy as voltage
○ Electrogenic pump: transport protein that generates voltage across a membrane
• Proton pump: main electrogenic pump of plants, fungi, and bacteria that actively transports
protons out of the cell
• Generating voltage across membranes => electrogenic pumps store energy that can be tapped

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 • Generating voltage across membranes => electrogenic pumps store energy that can be tapped
for cellular work
Cotransport: Coupled Transport by a Membrane Protein
• Cotransport: a transport protein (a cotransporter) can couple the "downhill" diffusion of the
solute to the "uphill" transport of a second substance against its own concentration gradient

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Concept 7.5 Bulk transport across the plasma membrane occurs by
exocytosis and endocytosis
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• Some other transport proteins => can use energy to move solutes against their concentration
gradients
Exocytosis:
• Exocytosis: cell secretes certain molecules by the fusion of vesicles with the plasma membrane
• Transport vesicle budded from the Golgi apparatus moves along a microtubule of the
cytoskeleton to the plasma membrane
• When the vesicle membrane and the plasma membrane come into contact, specific proteins in
both membranes rearrange the lipid molecules of the two bilayers so that the two membranes
fuse
• The contents of the vesicle spill out of the cell, and the vesicle membrane becomes part of the
plasma membrane

Endocytosis
• Endocytosis: cell takes in molecules and particulate matter by forming new vesicles from the
plasma membrane
• Proteins involved are different, essentially the reverse of exocytosis
1. Small area of plasma membrane sinks inward to form a pocket
2. Pocket deepens, it pinches in, forming a vesicle containing material that had been outside the
cell
3. Three types of endocytosis => phagocytosis (cellular eating), pinocytosis (cellular drinking), and
receptor mediated endocytosis
○ Receptor mediated endocytosis => used by human cells to take in cholesterol for
membrane synthesis and synthesis of other steroids
• Endocytosis and exocytosis provide mechanisms for rejuvenating or remodeling the plasma
membrane => processes occur continually in most eukaryotic cells, yet the amount of plasma
membrane in a nongrowing cell remains fairly constant
• Addition of membrane by one process appears to offset the loss of membrane by the other

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