Eur. Phys. J. B 10, 175-180 (1999)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s100510050841

Binding of oppositely charged membranes and membrane reorganization

¹ Department of Physics, University of California Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9530, USA
² Department of Materials, and Materials Research Laboratory, University of California Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9530, USA

Corresponding author: ^a alau@physics.ucsb.edu

Received: 13 October 1998
Published online: 15 July 1999

Abstract

We consider the electrostatic interaction between two rigid membranes, with different surface charge densities of opposite sign, across an aqueous solution without added salt. Exact solutions to the nonlinear Poisson-Boltzmann equation are obtained and their physical meaning discussed. We also calculate the electrostatic contribution to the free energy and discuss the renormalization of the area per head group of the charged lipids arising from the Coulomb interaction.