Eur. Phys. J. E (2006) 20: 409-420
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2006-10030-4

Regular Article

Budding and fission of a multiphase vesicle

Laboratoire de Physique Statistique, Ecole Normale Supérieure, 24 rue Lhomond, 75231 Cedex, Paris, France

^* e-mail: benamar@lps.ens.fr

Received: 21 April 2006
Accepted: 28 July 2006
Published online: 7 September 2006

Abstract

We present a model of bi-phasic vesicles in the limit of large surface tension. In this regime, the vesicle is completely stretched and well described by two spherical caps with a fold, which concentrates the membrane stress. The conservation laws and geometric constraints restrict the space of possible shapes to a pair of solutions labeled by a parameter given by line tension/pressure. For a given value of , the two solutions differ by the length of the interface between domains. For a critical value, , the two vesicle shapes become identical and no connected solution exists above this critical value. This model sheds new light on two proposed mechanisms (osmotic shocks and molecule absorption) to explain the budding and the fission in recent experiments.