Analysis of the Interaction between Giant Liposomes and Graphene Oxide

Abstract

Recently, the interaction between graphene and biological membranes has been under intensive research because graphene and its related materials exhibit distinctive characteristics. For example, water-soluble graphene oxide (GO) is expected to be used as a carrier of drug delivery systems (DDS), but it is also known to have cytotoxicity. Thus, it is important to understand the interaction between lipid bilayers and graphene/GO in order to design molecular systems. Furthermore, these interactions have been studied mostly using small lipid vesicles (< 1 μm), although the size of biological cells is much greater. In this study, we studied the interaction between GO and cell-sized giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs). We especially examined the effect of the lipid compositions, including neutral, negatively charged, and pyrene-grafted lipids. Pyrene is known to adhere to graphene with the non-covalent π-π stacking interaction. Microscope observations and flow cytometry measurement revealed that GUVs composed of lipids which have attractive interaction with GO rupture at a high probability.