Abstract

Merging properties in cells as crowded systems is that water near cell components has specific arrangements defined as the interphase region. Water in the adjacencies of biomembranes components can be defined in two states: molecules tightly bound to phosphates and carbonyl groups and its combinations and loose water in a second shell around those groups and the hydrocarbon chains [1,2]. The loose water can be exchanged by mechanical work (compression and expansion, creation of curvature, osmotic stress), electrical work by ion-binding and surface polarization and density changes (osmotic and hydric stress).

These considerations can be linked considering the water interphase phenomena as a motor of cell performance. In this approach, water organized in restricted environments plays a key role through specific structural arrangements which derives in thermodynamic responses essential to biological functions.

An holistic view of cells as a complex functional unity could open new strategies to understand physiological phenomena and pathological states as those caused by hydric stress, peroxidation, amyloid fibrils, lung surfactant functions among others and to the design of biomimetic systems employed in bio medicine and drug delivery systems as antimicrobial peptides and to the creation of artificial cells for biotechnological purposes.

Keywords: Cells -crowding-membrane; Interphases-hydration-responsive membrane