Jun Chen and Bridgette A. Barry*
School of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience,
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Received 17 August 2007, accepted 17 December 2007, DOI: 10.1111 ⁄ j.1751-1097.2008.00298.x
ABSTRACT
DrChen_2008_j.1751-1097.2008.00298
Photosystem II (PSII) carries out photosynthetic oxygen production and is responsible for the maintenance of aerobic, heterotrophic life. In PSII, protein amino acid residues play an important role in the light-driven electron transfer reactions. Here, we describe an approach to enhancing vibrational signals from PSII proteins through ultraviolet resonance Raman (UVRR) and a microprobe jet flow technique. Our work shows that pump-probe UVRR can be used to monitor intermediates during photosynthetic oxygen evolution.