Breathing and tumbling of multicomponent vesicles in a shear flow

Biological membranes are composed of numerous proteins and molecules which can form domain-like structures, resulting in variable material properties such as bending rigidity and spontaneous curvature of the membrane. In this talk we will focus on a two dimensional multicomponent vesicle in shear flow. Using small amplitude perturbation analysis a reduced order model is developed, revealing tank-treading and tumbling modes, and a new breathing mode which depends on membrane inhomogeneity. The theoretically derived dynamics are compared to the results of full numerical simulations. The utility of this model to predict spatially-varying membrane bending rigidity or spontaneous curvature in the lab setting will also be discussed.