  Under externally applied electric fields, lipid membranes tend to permeate
and change their electrical resistance by the combined processes of pore
creation and pore evolution (expansion or contraction). This study is focused
on the pore creation process, represented by an empirical expression currently
used in the electroporation (EP) models, for which an alternative theoretically
based expression was provided. The choice of this expression was motivated by
the role the DLVO's (disjoining) pressures may play in the process of EP. The
electrostatic energy effects on each sides of a lipid membrane were evaluated
in terms of the electrostatic component of the disjoining pressure. Thus the
pore creation energy considerations in the current EP models, associated with
the necessity of an idealized non conducting circular pre-pore were avoided. As
a result, a new expression for the onset of the electroporation was proposed.
It was found that this new theoretically determined expression is in good
agreement with the one estimated from an experiment that specifically targeted
the pore nucleation by eliminating the pore evolution process. Furthermore, the
proposed expression is dependent on the electrolyte and the lipid properties
and should provide better predictability than the currently used pore creation
EP model, which is only temperature dependent.
