Akihiro Kusumi

Akihiro Kusumi (楠見 明弘) is a Japanese biologist who proposed an explanation for reduced diffusion speed of lipid and protein molecules in the cell membrane, based on a model of hop diffusion in which lipids are confined to a reduced space, created by membrane-skeleton-induced compartments. These compartments allow the lipids or proteins to diffuse freely in a limited region and also limit the diffusion to neighboring compartments on the membrane. Getting to a new compartment is called "hop diffusion" while diffusion in the compartment is allowed by Brownian movement, the compartments of the cell are responsible of the reduced diffusion speed of the lipid or proteins when compared to artificial vesicles.