Photosynthetica 2018, 56(1):254-264 | DOI: 10.1007/s11099-018-0782-z

Increased thermal stability of photosystem II and the macro-organization of thylakoid membranes, induced by co-solutes, associated with changes in the lipid-phase behaviour of thylakoid membranes

C. Kotakis1, P. Akhtar1,2, O. Zsiros1, G. Garab1,3, P. H. Lambrev1,*
1 Institute of Plant Biology, Biological Research Centre, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Szeged, Hungary
2 Doctoral School in Biology, Faculty of Science and Informatics, University of Szeged, Szeged, Hungary
3 Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava, Ostrava, Czech Republic

The principal function of the thylakoid membrane depends on the integrity of the lipid bilayer, yet almost half of the thylakoid lipids are of non-bilayer-forming type, whose exact functions are not fully understood. Non-bilayer lipids can be extruded from the membrane in the presence of high concentrations of co-solutes. We applied 2 M sucrose to induce lipid phase separation in isolated thylakoid membranes, following consequent structural and physiological effects. Circular dichroism spectroscopy indicated significant changes in the chiral macro-arrangement of the pigment-protein complexes, which were reversed after washing out the co-solute. Similarly, merocyanine-540 fluorescence suggested reversible changes in the lipid phases. The PSII function, as tested by chlorophyll fluorescence induction transients and time-resolved fluorescence, was almost unaffected. However, the presence of sucrose dramatically increased the PSII thermostability, which can partly be explained by a direct osmolyte effect and partly by the lipid phase separation stabilizing the stacked membrane.

Keywords: circular dichroism; merocyanine-540; non-bilayer lipids; osmolyte; time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy

Received: September 11, 2017; Accepted: November 15, 2017; Published: March 1, 2018Show citation

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Kotakis, C., Akhtar, P., Zsiros, O., Garab, G., & Lambrev, P.H. (2018). Increased thermal stability of photosystem II and the macro-organization of thylakoid membranes, induced by co-solutes, associated with changes in the lipid-phase behaviour of thylakoid membranes. Photosynthetica, 56(1), 254-264. doi: 10.1007/s11099-018-0782-z.
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