Periciliary Brush Keeps Lungs HealthyMichael Rubinstein, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, DMR 0907515

Mucus clearance is the primary defense mechanism that protects airways from inhaled infectious and toxic agents. In the current Gel-on-Liquid mucus clearance model mucus gel is propelled on top of a “watery” periciliary layer surrounding the cilia. However, this model fails to explain the formation of distinct mucus layer in health or why mucus clearance fails in disease. We propose a Gel-on-Brush model in which the periciliary layer is occupied by membrane spanning mucins and mucopolysaccharides densely tethered to the airway surface. This brush prevents mucus penetration into the periciliary space and causes mucus to form a distinct layer. The relative osmotic moduli of the mucus and periciliary brush layers explain both the stability of mucus clearance in health and its failure in airway disease.

Summer School on “Polymers in Soft and Biological Matter”

Michael Rubinstein, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, DMR 0907515

Founded by physical chemists like Flory and brought into the mainstream of theoretical physics by visionaries like de Gennes, over the last eighty years polymer physics has grown into a mature, rich, and exciting discipline. Now expanded to include also colloids, liquid crystals, interfaces, etc, polymer and soft matter physics span fundamental statistical mechanics and field theory, most advanced materials, as well as technological and biological frontiers. Nevertheless, a comprehensive exposition to fundamental concepts of polymer and soft matter science is still largely missing, neglected in most physics departments, ignored by many workers in biological realm, and underappreciated even by chemical engineers. The goal of this year's Boulder summer school was to fill this gap and provide the physics community with a relatively comprehensive course in the fundamentals of polymer and soft matter physics with emphasis on their biological applications.

PI organized 2012 Boulder Summer School for Condensed Matter Physics on “Polymers in Soft and Biological Matter” http://boulder.research.yale.edu/Boulder-2012/index.html