Abstract
Photosynthetic water oxidation occurs in the oxygen evolving complex (OEC) of photosystem II (PS II). One-electron photo-oxidations in the reaction center of PS II are coupled to the four-electron oxidation of water in the OEC. As the PS II reaction center sequentially extracts electrons, the OEC cycles through five intermediate oxidation states (So-S4) where So is the least oxidized and S4 is a transient state which decays to So with the release of a dioxygen molecule. A complex of four manganese atoms has been shown to function in charge accumulation and is thought to form the catalytic site for the water oxidation reaction. The structure of this manganese complex and the mechanism of water oxidation have been the subject of vigorous inquiry by a great many research groups (Sauer et al., 1992).
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