On the nature of certain oscillations on bimolecular lipid membranes

Abstract

The origins and nature of bioelectric oscillations are mostly still obscure. The sustained electromechanical oscillations observed by Pant and Rosenberg on bimolecular lipid membranes (BLMs) are, therefore, of great theoretical and practicalimportance and worthy of detailed investigations. It will be shown that lipid molecules arranged in a bimolecular structure are in a spontaneously excited state (called exciton state) and that these excitons are involved in the charge-transfer processes at the interfaces. The detailed mechanism of the interfacial electrode processes suggests that certain lipid complexes may serve as catalysts promoting interfacial charge transfer and gives further support for the view that a mechanism different from the electrohydraulic one (Teorell's oscillator) may be responsible for the oscillations mentioned above.