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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 11: Posters: Cytoskeleton

BP 11.5: Poster

Tuesday, April 1, 2014, 09:30–12:30, P1

On the homogeneity of in vitro assembled keratin 8/18 networks — •Tobias Neckernuss¹, Katinka Mertens¹, Ines Martin¹, Tobias Paust¹, Michael Beil², Raphael Blumenfeld³, and Othmar Marti¹ — ¹Department of Experimental Physics, Ulm University, D-89069 Ulm — ²Clinic of Internal Medicine I, Ulm University, D-89069 — ³Department of Earth Science & Engineering, Imperial College London, GB-London SW7 2BP

The cytoskeleton of epithelial cells consists of three types of filament systems: microtubules, intermediate filaments IFs and actin filaments. In our work, we have a closer look on in vitro assembled intermediate filaments consisting of keratin 8/18 and MgCl₂, serving as a crosslinker. With an optical trap we are able to determine mechanical properties of the network by trapping and exciting an embedded polystyrene bead which motion is transferred via the network to response beads in the surrounding. Correlating the motion of the excited beads with the ones of the response beads allows us to determine the homogeneity of the network. The setup for such a multibead microrheology measurement is presented as well as the evaluation methods. Furthermore the linearity of the networks response is tested with single bead measurements.