Theoretical Work

Na/K-ATPase or Na/K pump is a most prevalent membrane active transporter to maintain the ionic concentration gradient and the membrane potential. Many diseases and patho-physiological conditions are associated with dysfunction of the Na/K pumps, due to either lack of ATP to fuel the pumps, defect in controlling the pump, or deficiency in the pump contents. The patho-physiology for individual diseases may not be the same. In order to cure the diseases or reduce the symptoms, all need quickly reinstall the pump functions.

Recently, we developed a novel technique, so called synchronization-modulation, to electrically activate the Na/K pump functions by introducing a concept from an electronic synchrotron accelerator to biological systems. Briefly, by application of a specially designed oscillating electric field, we can first synchronize the randomly paced individual pump molecules to run at the same pace as the field frequency, so that the Na- and K-transports are entrapped into the positive and negative half-cycle of the oscillating electric field. Consequently, the electric energy is provided to facilitate the corresponding transport alternatively in the two half-cycle. Then, by gradually changing the synchronization frequency and carefully maintaining the pump synchronization status the pump molecules will be entrained (acceleration or deceleration) to a defined pumping rate. The left figure represents randomly paced pump molecules while the right figure shows the synchronized pump molecules where the electric energy will be used to overcome the energy barrier of the corresponding transports.


Selected Publications