Biosynthesis of Chlorophyll a in a Purple Bacterial Phototroph and Assembly into a Plant Chlorophyll-Protein Complex

Hitchcock, Andrew, Jackson, Philip J, Chidgey, Jack W, Dickman, Mark J, Hunter, C Neil and Canniffe, Daniel P ORCID: 0000-0002-5022-0437 (2016) Biosynthesis of Chlorophyll a in a Purple Bacterial Phototroph and Assembly into a Plant Chlorophyll-Protein Complex. ACS Synthetic Biology, 5 (9). pp. 948-954.

Text 9. Hitchcock et al, 2016 Chl a in Rba. sphaeroides.pdf - Published version Download (1MB)

Abstract

Improvements to photosynthetic efficiency could be achieved by manipulating pigment biosynthetic pathways of photosynthetic organisms in order to increase the spectral coverage for light absorption. The development of organisms that can produce both bacteriochlorophylls and chlorophylls is one way to achieve this aim, and accordingly we have engineered the bacteriochlorophyll-utilizing anoxygenic phototroph Rhodobacter sphaeroides to make chlorophyll a. Bacteriochlorophyll and chlorophyll share a common biosynthetic pathway up to the precursor chlorophyllide. Deletion of genes responsible for the bacteriochlorophyll-specific modifications of chlorophyllide and replacement of the native bacteriochlorophyll synthase with a cyanobacterial chlorophyll synthase resulted in the production of chlorophyll a. This pigment could be assembled in vivo into the plant water-soluble chlorophyll protein, heterologously produced in Rhodobacter sphaeroides, which represents a proof-of-principle for the engineering of novel antenna complexes that enhance the spectral range of photosynthesis.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	photosynthesis, chlorophyll, bacteriochlorophyll, antenna complex, water-soluble chlorophyll protein, Rhodobacter sphaeroides
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	05 Feb 2019 11:47
Last Modified:	19 Jan 2023 01:05
DOI:	10.1021/acssynbio.6b00069
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3032074