Chinese Journal of Nature ›› 2021, Vol. 43 ›› Issue (3): 176-188.doi: 10.3969/j.issn.0253-9608.2021.03.003

• Review Article • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Structures and key bilins of red algal phycobilisomes

XIAO Yanan,MA Jianfei,YOU Xin,SUI Senfang①②   

  1. ①School of Life Sciences, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, China; ②School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
  • Received:2021-04-06 Online:2021-06-25 Published:2021-06-13

Abstract: Phycobilisomes are large water-soluble light-harvesting complexes in red algae and cyanobacteria, with the energy transfer efficiency higher than 95%. The high-resolution structures of phycobilisomes resolved so far are from the red algae Griffithsia pacifica and Porphyridium purpureum, providing important information of the overall structures of the phycobilisomes, especially the structures and functions of linker proteins. Furthermore, linker proteins regulate the energy state of chromophores in Porphyridium purpureum phycobilisome. In this review, we analyze the overall structures of red algal phycobilisomes and the microenvironments of key chromophores.