Molecular determinants of lipid domain shape

We examined domains formed by two different lipids to investigate the influ ence of molecular structure on domain shape. In particular, we addressed th e question as to whether domains of different lipids can exhibit a common f orm while maintaining their distinctive shapes. We chose dipalmitoylphospha tidylcholine and dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine because they share a common head group and differ only in the length of their hydrocarbon tails. Our r esults show that their domains do indeed exhibit a common form despite vari ations in detail imposed by the difference in chain length.