Membrane transport

 Cells exchange molecules with their environment but at the same time, it must be
impermeable to intracellular molecules to prevent their leakage.
 Nutrients must be imported into cells and waste products must be removed.
 Many substances cannot just diffuse across membranes, need specialised membrane
transport proteins.

why is membrane transport important?

 Living cells maintain an internal ion composition that is different from external ion
composition.
 Cells need to take up nutrients and release waste products – these would cross lipid
bilayer very slowly by diffusion

Lipids are impermeable to solutes and ions

 Hydrophobic interior of the lipid bilayer represents a barrier to most hydrophilic

molecules and ions (charged )
 The main energetic barrier to diffusion is the activation energy required to move the
substrate from the aqueous phase into the apolar environment of phospholipid
bilayer
 Rate of diffusion depends on size of the molecule and solubility props

Rate of dissusion

 Small nonpolar molecules can mostly pass through

 Uncharged polar molecules can also pass through but should be small enough
 Ions and charged molecules – membranes are highly impermeable to these no
matter how small
Membrane transport proteins

2 classes
 Transporters
 Channels
Both transmembrane proteins

 Transporters allow only those molecules that fit into a binding site, a conformational
change transfers molecules across the membrane, there is a requirement for specific
binding which makes the transport selective
 Channels discriminate on the basis of charge and size

Transport proteins
Protein-mediated passive transport
 Transport protein in passive transport act like enzymes
  The difference is that the transported molecule ends up in the same chemical state
but different compartment.

Like enzyme-catalysed reactions

 Transport is specific (binding sites involved)

 Can be inhibited by structural analogues.
 The rate of transport is higher than diffusion.
 Transport displays saturation kinetics (finite number of binding sites )

Protein-mediated passive transport

• Driven by chemical potential (concentration) gradient or if charged
then electrochemical potential gradient – acts to dissipate the
gradients
• Not vectorial – reverse gradients reverses transport direction – doesn't have a fixed
direction n
• Protein –mediated passive transport also called facilitated transport
and has no energy requirement (ATP)

Channel proteins

Act like very fast enzymes, catalyse the transfer (net movement) of 106 to
108 ions per second
• Selectivity of transported ions vary eg some channels are highly selective
for Ca2+ ions cf other divalent ions
• Selectivity determined by several factors – surface charge, pore size also
amino acid residues lining the aqueous pore
• Exit of ions controlled by conformational gate – defines open and closed
states ie ion channels are gated (open and shut transiently)
• The gate can respond to voltage across membrane
• phosphorylation or binding to other ligands on extracellular or cytoplasmic
side can control channel activity

Active transport – movement against gradients

Cells need to be able to do more than just passive transport

• Active transport of solutes occurs against concentration gradients
essential to maintain for eg the unequal distribution of ions
inside/outside of cells
• Active transport can be
• Primary- driven by ATP hydrolysis (e.g sodium -potassium pump )
• Secondary- energy input from movement of ion down its electrochemical
Gradient (co transport )
• Very specific and displays saturation kinetics ( because there is only a finite number of
binding sites )
Secondary active transport

solute-coupled transport)
• Gradient is used to drive the transport of another solute against its
gradient
• Solute transported (against its gradient) in the same direction with
coupled ion then transporter is termed symporter
• If solute transported in opposite direction to coupled ion, transporter
is termed antiporter

(insert secondary active transport picture )