The transfer of lipids between small unilamellar vesicles of either dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine (DMPC), dimyristoylphosphatidylglycerol (DMPG), or dioctadecyl diammonium bromide (DODAB) and a single bilayer on a solid support of chain perdeuterated DMPC-d54 has been studied by time-resolved ATR infrared spectroscopy, deuterium NMR, and DSC. The IR method was used for measuring the transfer kinetics and the amount of lipid transferred to the supported bilayer, while NMR was employed for the assessment of molecular order and for the occurrence of lipid asymmetries due to the transfer. We find that the composition of a supported planar dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine (DMPC-d54) bilayer can be modified by incubation with high concentrations of sonicated vesicles consisting of the donor lipid. Three cases were studied. First, the incubation was done with DMPC as donor lipid. The kinetics of this process is double exponential and comparatively slow, with a half-time in the range of several hours. The activation energy was estimated as 50 +/- 2 kJ/mol. In a second set of measurements, cationic DODAB or anionic DMPG was used as donor lipid. The kinetics of this transfer is 1 order of magnitude faster than for DMPC and can be described by a single exponential. For DMPG transfer, we obtained an activation energy of 35 +/- 2 kJ/mol. Independent of the headgroup charge of the donor lipid, 25-35% of the (acceptor) DMPC in the supported bilayer is not accessible for exchange with the donor lipid. The transfer of either DMPG or DODAB causes drastic changes of the phase transition behavior of the supported bilayer without significantly altering the lipid packing density of the lipids.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)