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Bacteriochlorophyll organization and energy transfer kinetics in chlorosomes from Chloroflexus aurantiacus depend on the light regime during growth

Photosynthesis Research volume 47, pages 157–165 (1996)Cite this article

Abstract

We have used measurements of fluorescence and circular dichroism (CD) to compare chlorosome-membrane preparations derived from the green filamentous bacterium Chloroflexus aurantiacus grown in continuous culture at two different light-intensities. The cells grown under low light (6 μmol m−2 s−1) had a higher ratio of bacteriochlorophyll (BChl) c to BChl a than cells grown at a tenfold higher light intensity; the high-light-grown cells had much more carotenoid per bacteriochlorophyll.

The anisotropy of the QY band of BChl c was calculated from steady-state fluorescence excitation and emission spectra with polarized light. The results showed that the BChl c in the chlorosomes derived from cells grown under high light has a higher structural order than BChl c in chlorosomes from low-light-grown cells. In the central part of the BChl c fluorescence emission band, the average angles between the transition dipole moments for BChl c molecules and the symmetry axis of the chlorosome rod element were estimated as 25° and 17° in chlorosomes obtained from the low- and high-light-grown cells, respectively.

This difference in BChl organization was confirmed by the decay associated spectra of the two samples obtained using picosecond single-photon-counting experiments and global analysis of the fluorescence decays. The shortest decay component obtained, which probably represents energy-transfer from the chlorosome bacteriochlorophylls to the BChl a in the baseplate, was 15 ps in the chlorosomes from high-light-grown cell but only 7 ps in the preparation from low-light grown cells. The CD spectra of the two preparations were very different: chlorosomes from low-light-grown cells had a type II spectrum, while those from high-light-grown cells was of type I (Griebenow et al. (1991) Biochim Biophys Acta 1058: 194–202). The different shapes of the CD spectra confirm the existence of a qualitatively different organization of the BChl c in the two types of chlorosome.

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Abbreviations

BChl:

bacteriochlorophyll

CD:

circular dichroism

DAS:

decay associated spectrum

PMSF:

phenylmethylsulfonyl fluoride

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Affiliations

  1. Department of Physical Chemistry, Umeå University, S-901 87, Umeå, Sweden

    Ying-Zhong Ma & Tomas Gillbro

  2. Institute of Biochemistry, Odense University, Campusvej 55, DK-5230, Odense M, Denmark

    Raymond P. Cox & Mette Miller

Authors
  1. Ying-Zhong Ma
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  2. Raymond P. Cox
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  3. Tomas Gillbro
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  4. Mette Miller
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Ma, YZ., Cox, R.P., Gillbro, T. et al. Bacteriochlorophyll organization and energy transfer kinetics in chlorosomes from Chloroflexus aurantiacus depend on the light regime during growth. Photosynth Res 47, 157–165 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00016178

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00016178

Key words

  • circular dichroism
  • decay-associated-spectra (DAS)
  • fluorescence anisotropy
  • green bacteria
  • pigment organization