Cell membranes, mediator of many biological mechanisms from adhesion and metabolism up to mutation and infection, are highly dynamic and heterogeneous environments exhibiting a strong coupling between biochemical events and structural re-organisation. This involves conformational changes induced, at lower scales, by lipid order transitions and by the micro-mechanical interplay of lipids with transmembrane proteins and molecular diffusion. Particular attention is focused on lipid rafts, ordered lipid microdomains rich of signalling proteins, that co-localise to enhance substance trafficking and activate different intracellular biochemical pathways. In this framework, the theoretical modelling of the dynamic clustering of lipid rafts implies a full multiphysics coupling between the kinetics of phase changes and the mechanical work performed by transmembrane proteins on lipids, involving the bilayer elasticity. This mechanism produces complex interspecific dynamics in which membrane stresses and chemical potentials do compete by determining different morphological arrangements, alteration in diffusive walkways and coalescence phenomena, with a consequent influence on both signalling potential and intracellular processes. Therefore, after identifying the leading chemo-mechanical interactions, the present work investigates from a modelling perspective the spatio-temporal evolution of raft domains to theoretically explain co-localisation and synergy between proteins’ activation and raft formation, by coupling diffusive and mechanical phenomena to observe different morphological patterns and clustering of ordered lipids. This could help to gain new insights into the remodelling of cell membranes and could potentially suggest mechanically based strategies to control their selectivity, by orienting intracellular functions and mechanotransduction.

细胞膜是从粘附和代谢到突变和感染的许多生物机制的介导者，是高度动态和异质的环境，表现出生化事件和结构重组之间的强耦合。这涉及在较低尺度上由脂质顺序转变以及脂质与跨膜蛋白和分子扩散的微机械相互作用引起的构象变化。特别关注的是脂筏，富含信号蛋白的有序脂质微结构域，它们共定位以增强物质运输并激活不同的细胞内生化途径。在此框架中，脂筏动态聚类的理论模型意味着相变动力学与跨膜蛋白对脂质所做的机械功之间的完全多物理场耦合，涉及双层弹性。这种机制产生复杂的种间动力学，其中膜应力和化学势通过确定不同的形态排列、扩散走道的改变和聚结现象进行竞争，从而对信号电位和细胞内过程产生影响。因此，在确定了主要的化学-机械相互作用后，目前的工作从建模角度研究筏结构域的时空演化，通过将扩散和机械现象耦合到理论上解释蛋白质激活和筏形成之间的共定位和协同作用。观察有序脂质的不同形态模式和聚类。这可能有助于获得对细胞膜重塑的新见解，并有可能提出基于机械的策略来通过定向细胞内功能和力转导来控制其选择性。