Quantitative structures are obtained at 30°C for the fully hydrated fluid phases of palmitoyloleoylphosphatidylcholine (POPC),
with a double bond on the
sn-2 hydrocarbon chain, and for dierucoylphosphatidylcholine (di22:1PC), with a double bond on each hydrocarbon chain. The form
factors
F(
qz) for both lipids are obtained using a combination of three methods. (1) Volumetric measurements provide
F(0). (2) X-ray scattering from extruded unilamellar vesicles provides Ι
F(
qz)Ι for low
qz. (3) Diffuse X-ray scattering from oriented stacks of bilayers provides Ι
F(
qz)Ι for high
qz. Also, data using method (2) are added to our recent data for dioleoylphosphatidylcholine (DOPC) using methods (1) and (3);
the new DOPC data agree very well with the recent data and with (4) our older data obtained using a liquid crystallographic
X-ray method. We used hybrid electron density models to obtain structural results from these form factors. The result for
area per lipid (
A) for DOPC 72.4 ± 0.5 Å
2 agrees well with our earlier publications, and we find
A = 69.3 ± 0.5 Å
2 for di22:1PC and
A = 68.3 ± 1.5 Å
2 for POPC. We obtain the values for five different average thicknesses: hydrophobic, steric, head-head, phosphate-phosphate
and Luzzati. Comparison of the results for these three lipids and for our recent dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine (DMPC) determination
provides quantitative measures of the effect of unsaturation on bilayer structure. Our results suggest that lipids with one
monounsaturated chain have quantitative bilayer structures closer to lipids with two monounsaturated chains than to lipids
with two completely saturated chains.
Keywords X-ray scattering - Phospholipid bilayer - Dierucoylphosphatidylcholine - Palmitoyloleoyl- phosphatidylcholine - Dioleoylphosphatidylcholine - Unsaturated lipids - Bilayer structure - Area per lipid - Fully hydrated fluid phase