Membrane curvature is a critical physical property of biological membranes,
playing a fundamental role in regulating a variety of essential cellular processes,
including endocytosis, exocytosis, vesicle formation, membrane fusion,
and cytokinesis. In these processes,
membrane curvature is not merely a byproduct of dynamic membrane remodeling but also a key driving force underlying membrane reshaping and associated molecular behaviors.
Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations represent a powerful and widely utilized computational approach for investigating the interactions between membrane curvature and membrane proteins.
Curved Membrane (Cmem) Builder is
a versatile tool specifically designed to construct coarse-grained (CG) MD initial configurations for lipid membranes with defined curvatures and associated protein-membrane complexes.
Cmem Builder offers an intuitive user interface, advanced visualization features,
and extensive customization options,
enabling researchers to efficiently generate curved membrane systems through automated workflows.
Figure 1 shows an application example of the Cmem Builder tool for constructing a curved membrane.
Figure 1. Curved membrane systems constructed using Cmem Builder
(a) Simulation of the BAR domain embedded in a symmetric bilayer system.
(b) The Piezo1 protein embedded in a curved POPC bilayer
(c) Simulation of an asymmetric plasma membrane system with distinct lipid compositions in the upper and lower leaflets.
Contact us
Centre for Artificial Intelligence Driven Drug Discovery, Faculty of Applied Sciences, Macao Polytechnic University, Macao SAR 999078, China.
Email:shuli@mpu.edu.mo
