Abstract
For endocytosis and exocytosis, membranes transition among planar, budding, and vesicular topographies through nanoscale reorganization of lipids, proteins, and carbohydrates. However, prior attempts to understand the initial stages of nanoscale bending have been limited by experimental resolution. Through the implementation of polarized localization microscopy, this article reports the inherent membrane bending capability of cholera toxin subunit B (CTxB) in quasi-one-component-supported lipid bilayers. Membrane buds were first detected with <50 nm radius, grew to >200 nm radius, and extended into longer tubules with dependence on the membrane tension and CTxB concentration. Compared to the concentration of the planar-supported lipid bilayers, CTxB was (12 ± 4)× more concentrated on the positive curvature top and (26 ± 11)× more concentrated on the negative Gaussian curvature neck of the nanoscale membrane buds. CTxB is frequently used as a marker for liquid-ordered lipid phases; however, the coupling between CTxB and membrane bending provides an alternate understanding of CTxB-induced membrane reorganization. These findings allow for the reinterpretation of prior observations by correlating CTxB clustering and diffusion to CTxB-induced membrane bending. Single-particle tracking was performed on single lipids and CTxB to reveal the correlations among single-molecule diffusion, CTxB accumulation, and membrane topography. Slowed lipid and CTxB diffusion was observed at the nanoscale bud locations, suggesting a local increase in the effective membrane viscosity or molecular crowding upon membrane bending. These results suggest inherent CTxB-induced membrane bending as a mechanism for initiating CTxB internalization in cells that could be independent of clathrin, caveolin, actin, and lipid phase separation.