Link to bioRxiv paper: http://biorxiv.org/cgi/content/short/2020.10.08.331629v1?rss=1 Authors: Rojas Molina, R. V., Liese, S., Carlson, A. Abstract: Diffusion is a fundamental mechanism for protein distribution in cell membranes. These membranes often exhibit complex shapes, which range from shallow domes to elongated tubular or pearl-like structures. Shape complexity of the membrane influences the diffusive spreading of proteins and molecules. Despite the importance membrane geometry plays in these diffusive processes, it is challenging to establish the dependence between diffusion and membrane morphology. We solve the diffusion equation numerically on various curved shapes representative for experimentally observed membrane shapes. Our results show that membrane necks become diffusion barriers. We determine the diffusive half time, i.e., the time that is required to reduce the amount of proteins in the budded region by one half and find a quadratic relation between the diffusive half time and the averaged mean curvature of the membrane shape. Our findings thus help to estimate the characteristic diffusive time scale based on the simple measure for membrane morphology. Copy rights belong to original authors. Visit the link for more info