publications

2025

Doktorova M‡, Daum S, Reagle TR, Cannon HI, Ebenhan J, Neudorf S, Han B, Sharma S, Kasson P, Levental K, Bacia K, Kenworthy AK‡, Levental I‡. 2025. Caveolin assemblies displace one bilayer leaflet to organize and bend membranes. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. Accepted. (‡ co-corresponding author)

Doktorova M‡, Symons JL, Zhang X, Wang HY, Schlegel J, Lorent JH, Heberle FA, Sezgin E, Lyman E, Levental KR‡, Levental I‡. 2025. Cell membranes sustain phospholipid imbalance via cholesterol asymmetry. Cell. In press. DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2025.02.034 (‡ co-corresponding author)

Wang HY, Rumin A, Doktorova M, Sputay D, Chan SH, Wehman AM, Levental KR, Levental I. 2025. Loss of lipid asymmetry facilitates plasma membrane blebbing by decreasing membrane lipid packing. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. In press.

Sputay D, Doktorova M, Chan SH, Guo E, Wang HY, Lorent JH, Levental I, Levental KR. 2025. Immune cell activation produces locally scrambled foci of plasma membrane lipids. Faraday Discuss. In press. DOI: 10.1039/D4FD00205A

Heberle FA, Doktorova M‡. 2025. Exploring the sensitivities of experimental techniques to various types of membrane asymmetry using atomistic simulations. Faraday Discuss. In press. DOI: 10.1039/D4FD00200H

Chaisson EH, Heberle FA‡, Doktorova M‡. 2025. Quantifying acyl chain interdigitation in simulated bilayers via direct transbilayer interactions. J. Chem. Inf. Model. 65:3879-3885. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jcim.4c02287 (‡ co-corresponding author)

2024

Doktorova M‡, Khelashvili G, Brown, MF‡. 2024. Efficient calculation of orientation-dependent lipid dynamics from membrane simulations. bioRxiv. DOI: 10.1101/2023.05.23.542012 (‡ co-corresponding author)

Sharma KD, Doktorova M, Waxham N, Heberle FA. 2024. Cryo-EM images of phase separated lipid bilayer vesicles analyzed with a machine learning approach. Biophys. J. 123:2877-2891. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2024.04.029

2023

Doktorova M, Levental I, Heberle FA. 2023. Seeing the Membrane from Both Sides Now: Lipid Asymmetry and Its Strange Consequences. Cold Spring Harb. Perspect. Biol. a041393. DOI: 10.1101/cshperspect.a041393

Chaisson E, Heberle FA, Doktorova M‡. 2023. Building asymmetric lipid bilayers for Molecular Dynamics simulations: What methods exist and how to choose one? Membranes. 13(7):629. DOI: 10.3390/membranes13070629

Doktorova M‡, Khelashvili G, Ashkar R, Brown, MF‡. 2023. Molecular simulations and NMR reveal how lipid fluctuations affect membrane mechanics. Biophys. J. 122:984-1002. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2022.12.007 (‡ co-corresponding author)

2022

Doktorova M‡ and Levental, I. Cholesterol’s balancing act: Defying the status quo. 2022. Biophys. J. 121:1-3. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2022.08.036 (‡ corresponding author)

Castillo SR, Rickeard BW, DiPasquale M, Nguyen MHL, Lewis-Laurent A, Doktorova M, Kav B, Miettinen MS, Nagao M, Kelley EG, Marquardt D. 2022. Probing the link between Pancratistatin and mitochondrial apoptosis through changes in the membrane dynamics on the nanoscale. Mol. Pharmaceutics. 19:1839-1852. DOI: 10.1021/acs.molpharmaceut.1c00926

Gupta S, Doole FT, Kumarage T, Doktorova M, Khelashvili G, Ashkar R, Brown MF. 2022. Cholesterol stiffening of lipid membranes and drug interactions: Insights from neutron spin echo and deuterium NMR spectroscopy. In Cholesterol, Bukiya A and Dopico A Eds. (pp. 771-796). Academic Press. DOI: /10.1016/B978-0-323-85857-1.00037-7

2021

Lewis-Laurent A, Doktorova M, Heberle FA, Marquardt D. 2021. Vesicle Viewer: Online visualization and analysis of small-angle scattering from lipid vesicles. Biophys. J. 120:4639-4648. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2021.09.018

Frewein MPK, Doktorova M, Heberle FA, Scott HL, Semeraro EF, Porcar L, Pabst G. 2021. Structure and interdigitation of chain-asymmetric phosphatidylcholines and milk sphingomyelin in the fluid phase. Symmetry. 13:1441. DOI: 10.3390/sym13081441

Scott HL, Kennison KB, Enoki TA, Doktorova M, Kinnun JJ, Heberle FA, Katsaras J. 2021. Model membrane systems used to study plasma membrane lipid asymmetry. Symmetry. 13:1356. DOI: 10.3390/sym13081356

Ashkar R, Doktorova M, Heberle FA, Scott HL, Barrera FN, Katsaras J, Khelashvili G, Brown MF. 2021. Reply to Nagle et al.: The universal stiffening effects of cholesterol on lipid membranes. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 118:20. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2102845118

Khelashvili G, Plante A, Doktorova M, Weinstein H. 2021. Ca2+-dependent mechanism of membrane insertion and destabilization by the SARS-CoV-2 fusion peptide. Biophys. J. 120:1105-1119. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2021.02.023

2020

Doktorova M, Symons JL, Levental I. 2020. Structural and functional consequences of reversible lipid asymmetry in living membranes. Nat. Chem. Biol. 16:1321- 1330. DOI: 10.1038/s41589-020-00688-0

Chakraborty S, Doktorova M, Molugu TR, Heberle FA, Scott HL, Dzikovski B, Nagao M, Stingaciu LR, Standaert RF, Barrera F, Katsaras J, Khelashvili G, Brown MF, Ashkar R. 2020. How cholesterol stiffens unsaturated lipid membranes. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 117:21896-21905. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2004807117

Doktorova M, Kúcerka N, Kinnun JJ, Pan J, Marquardt D, Scott HL, Venable RM, Pastor RW, Wassall SR, Katsaras J, Heberle FA. 2020. Molecular structure of sphingomyelin in fluid phase bilayers determined by the joint analysis of small-angle neutron and X-ray scattering data. J. Phys. Chem. B. 124:5186-5200. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcb.0c03389

Heberle FA, Doktorova M, Scott HL, Skinkle AD, Waxham N, Levental I. 2020. Direct label-free imaging of nanodomains in biomimetic and biological membranes by cryogenic electron microscopy. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 117:19943-19952. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2002200117

Lorent JH, Levental KR, Ganesan L, Rivera-Longsworth G, Sezgin E, Doktorova M, Lyman E, Levental I. 2020. Plasma membranes are asymmetric in lipid unsaturation, packing and protein shape. Nat. Chem. Biol. 16:644-652. DOI: 10.1038/s41589-020-0529-6

Ballweg S, Sezgin E, Doktorova M, Covino R, Reinhard J, Wunnicke D, Hänelt I, Levental I, Hummer G, and Ernst R. 2020. Regulation of lipid saturation without sensing membrane fluidity. Nat. Commun. 11:1-13. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-14528-1

Doktorova M. On the long and winding road to a perfect membrane model. 2020. Biophys. J. 118:273-275. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2019.11.3386 (Biophysical Journal Spotlight on Early Career Investigators 2020)

2019

Khelashvili G, Cheng X, Falzone ME, Doktorova M, Accardi A, Weinstein H. 2019. Membrane lipids are both the substrates and a mechanistically responsive environment of TMEM16 scramblase proteins. J. Comput. Chem. 9999:1-14. DOI: 10.1002/jcc.26105

Nguyen MHL, DiPasquale M, Rickeard BW, Doktorova M, Heberle FA, Scott HL, Barrera FN, Taylor G, Collier CP, Stanley CB, Katsaras J, Marquardt D. 2019. Peptide-induced lipid flip-flop in asymmetric liposomes measured by small angle neutron scattering. Langmuir. 35:11735-11744. DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.9b01625

Doktorova M‡, Heberle FA, Marquardt D, Russinova R, Sanford L, Peyear T, Katsaras J, Feigenson GW, Weinstein H, and Andersen OS. 2019. Gramicidin increases lipid flip-flop in symmetric and asymmetric lipid vesicles. Biophys. J. 116:860-873. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2019.01.016 (‡ corresponding author)

Doktorova M‡, LeVine M, Khelashvili G, and Weinstein H. 2019. A new computational method for membrane compressibility: Bilayer mechanical thickness revisited. Biophys. J. 116:487-502. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2018.12.016 (‡ corresponding author)

2018

Doktorova M‡, and Weinstein H. 2018. Accurate in silico modeling of asymmetric bilayers based on biophysical principles. Biophys. J. 115:1638-1643. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2018.09.008 (‡ corresponding author)

Doktorova M*, Heberle FA*, Geier B, Standaert RF, Katsaras J, London E, Pabst G, and Marquardt D*. 2018. Preparation of asymmetric phospholipid vesicles for use as cell membrane models. Nat. Protoc. 13:2086-2101. DOI: 10.1038/s41596-018-0033-6 (* co-first author)

2017

Doktorova M*, Heberle FA*, Kingston RL, Khelashvili G, Cuendet MA, Wen Y, Katsaras J, Feigenson GW, Vogt VM, and Dick RA*. 2017. Cholesterol promotes binding of retroviral matrix protein by indirectly affecting membrane electrostatics and solvation properties. Biophys. J. 113:2004-2015. DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2017.08.055 (* co-first author) (featured article)

Doktorova M, Harries D, and Khelashvili, G. 2017. Determination of bending rigidity and tilt modulus of lipid membranes from real-space fluctuation analysis of molecular dynamics simulations. Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 19:16806-16818. DOI: 10.1039/C7CP01921A

2016

Heberle FA*, Marquardt D*, Doktorova M*, Geier B*, Standaert RF, Heftberger P, Kollmitzer B, Nickels JD, Dick RA, Feigenson GW, Katsaras J, London E, and Pabst G. 2016. Subnanometer structure of an asymmetric model membrane: Interleaflet coupling influences domain properties. Langmuir. 32:5195-5200, DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.5b04562 (* co-first author) (journal cover)

2015

Khelashvili G, Doktorova M, Sahai M, Johner N, Shi L, and Weinstein H. 2015. Computational modeling of the N-terminus of the human dopamine transporter and its interaction with PIP2-containing membranes. Proteins. 83:952-969. DOI: 10.1002/prot.24792

2014

Shamsuddin R, Doktorova M, Jaswal S, Lee-St. John A and McMenimen K. 2014. Computational prediction of hinge axes in proteins. BMC Bioinformatics. 15 (Suppl 8): S2. DOI: 10.1186/1471-2105-15-S8-S2

2013

Heberle FA*, Doktorova M*, Goh SL*, Standaert RF, Katsaras J, and Feigenson GW. 2013. Hybrid and nonhybrid lipids exert common effects on membrane raft size and morphology. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 135:14932-14935. DOI: 10.1021/ja407624c (* co-first author)