Excitation Energy Transfer from Bacteriochlorophyll b in the B800 Site to B850 Bacteriochlorophyll a in Light-Harvesting Complex 2.

Abstract

Control of the spectral overlap between energy donors and acceptors provides insight into excitation energy transfer (EET) mechanisms in photosynthetic light-harvesting proteins. Substitution of energy-donating B800 bacteriochlorophyll (BChl) a with other pigments in the light-harvesting complex 2 (LH2) of purple photosynthetic bacteria has been extensively performed; however, most studies on the B800 substitution have focused on the decrease in the spectral overlap integral with energy-accepting B850 BChl a by reconstitution of chlorophylls into the B800 site. Here, we reconstitute BChl b into the B800 site of the LH2 protein from Rhodoblastus acidophilus to increase the spectral overlap with B850 BChl a. BChl b in the B800 site had essentially the same hydrogen-bonding pattern as B800 BChl a, whereas it showed a red-shifted Qy absorption band at 831 nm. The EET rate from BChl b to B850 BChl a in the reconstituted LH2 was similar to that of native LH2 despite the red shift of the Qy band of the energy donor. These results demonstrate the importance of the contribution of the density of excitation states of the B850 circular assembly, which incorporates higher lying optically forbidden states, to intracomplex EET in LH2.