The propagation of sound waves on lipid monolayers supported on water has been previously studied during the melting transition. Since changes in volume, area, and compressibility in lipid membranes have biological relevance, the observed sound propagation is of paramount importance. However, it is unknown what would occur on a lipid bilayer, which is a more approximate model of a cell membrane. With the aim to answer this relevant question, we built an experimental setup to assemble long artificial lipid membranes. We found that if these membranes are heated in order to force local melting, a thermo-mechanical perturbation propagates a long distance. Our findings may support the existence of solitary waves, postulated to explain the propagation of isentropic signals together with the action potential in neurons.

中文翻译：

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热机械扰动在脂质膜上的传播

先前已经研究了在熔融转变过程中声波在水支持的脂质单层上的传播。由于脂质膜的体积，面积和可压缩性的变化具有生物学相关性，因此观察到的声音传播至关重要。然而，尚不清楚在脂质双层上会发生什么，脂质双层是细胞膜的更近似模型。为了回答这个相关问题，我们建立了一个实验装置来组装长的人造脂质膜。我们发现，如果加热这些膜以促使局部熔化，则热机械扰动会传播很长的距离。我们的发现可能支持孤立波的存在，假定它可以解释等熵信号的传播以及神经元的动作电位。