The loaded-carrier balance gives . Substitute the preceding two complex concentrations and collect the current terms:Next carrier conservation givesEliminate between these relations and set . Simplification yieldsHere must be the total carrier protein, as in the conservation equation. Calling it total substrate in the final line of the scan is a typographical inconsistency; total substrate is the different invariant .
For carrier-turnover saturation of passive transport at fixed , write , and . Then , soThe flux is outward when the substrate gradient is reversed and inward when . Saturation occurs because there is a finite carrier population and finite binding-release/conformational turnover: arbitrarily abundant exterior substrate cannot make carriers cycle arbitrarily quickly. This is passive facilitated transport, so no maintained flux remains when the two free concentrations agree. Varying at fixed compares reservoir-controlled steady states or systems with different total substrate; it is not a trajectory preserving one fixed .
Carrier-mediated transport: reversal and saturation at fixed interior concentration
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