Contribution of the Nernst potential to stiffness constants: the asymmetrical case.

Inside biological membranes, one of the fundamental functions of active proteins such as pumps is to generate some electrochemical gradient across the membrane and then, to establish a new stationary state. The membrane electric potential generated by activity modifies the stiffness constants of the membrane. A spontaneous curvature appears if the inner and outer Debye lengths are different. The corresponding characteristic radius falls in the range from 0.08 microm to 50 microm. The bending elastic modulus is always increased. This effect is only noticeable in the limit of large Debye length from 0.5 microm to 0.09 microm. For a Nernst potential of 100 mV and a Debye length of 0.2 microm, the bending modulus can reach 40k(B)T.