Structural role of photosystem II supercomplexes in thylakoid membrane stacking

地球上的生命依靠光合作用，这是我们所有食物、氧气和大部分能量的来源。光合作用的早期步骤包括通过光合膜中的电子转移反应捕获太阳能。我们最近的研究揭示了膜蛋白光系统II （PSII）超复合物在介导叶绿体类囊体膜堆积中的意想不到的作用。膜堆叠促使慢激发能阱PSII与快激发能阱PSII （PSI）的空间分离，并促进PSII单元之间的能量传递，这两者对光合作用的效率都至关重要。这是我们第一次从生物化学上分离出一种独特的PSII超复合物的堆叠形式，这将使我们能够研究这一过程的关键特征。该项目将利用结构和功能显微镜的最新进展来表征这种PSII超复合体，并了解类囊体膜如何以及为什么在分子细节上堆叠。

Life on earth depends on photosynthesis, the source of all of our food, oxygen and most of our energy. The early steps of photosynthesis involve trapping of solar energy by electron transfer reactions in the photosynthetic membrane. Our recent studies have revealed an unexpected role for the membrane protein photosystem II (PSII) supercomplexes in mediating the stacking of chloroplast thylakoid membranes. Membrane stacking instigates the spatial segregation of the slow excitation energy trap PSII from the faster trap photosystem I (PSI), and promotes energy transfer among PSII units both of which are crucial for the efficiency of photosynthesis. For the first time we have biochemically-isolated a unique stacked form of the PSII supercomplex which will allow us to investigate this critical feature of the process. This project will make use of the latest advances in structural and functional microscopies to characterise this PSII supercomplex and understand how and why thylakoid membranes stack in molecular detail.