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No observable conformational changes in PSII

Nature volume 533, pages E1–E2 (2016)Cite this article

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arising from C. Kupitz et al. Nature 513, 261–265 (2014); 10.1038/nature13453

It is well established1 that light flashes produce a succession of oxidation events in photosystem II (PSII), driving an initially dark-equilibrated sample (the S1 state) through a series of states (S2 and S3) that represent the accumulation of oxidizing equivalents at the Mn-containing oxygen-evolving complex (OEC), while electrons are transferred to a remote acceptor site. Kupitz et al.2 recently claimed that significant photoinduced conformational changes are observed in PSII using ‘diffract before destroy’ X-ray crystallography techniques at an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) source. Although crystallography experiments can potentially give mechanistic insights into PSII-mediated water splitting, the authors’ illumination conditions are not suited to move a significant fraction of the system into the S3 state, and their claim of conformational differences between the S1 state and the two-flash sample is not supported by their crystallographic data.

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Figure 1: Reanalysis of the electron density from ref.2 data.
Figure 2: Electron density variability between the two data sets.

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Author notes

  1. Present addresses: Stanford PULSE Institute, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, California 94025, USA (S.K. and U.B.).

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Nicholas K. Sauter, Nathaniel Echols, Paul D. Adams, Petrus H. Zwart, Jan Kern, Aaron S. Brewster, Junko Yano & Vittal K. Yachandra

  2. LCLS, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, California, 94025, USA

    Jan Kern, Roberto Alonso-Mori & Uwe Bergmann

  3. Institutionen för Kemi, Kemiskt Biologiskt Centrum, Umeå Universitet, Umeå, 90187, Sweden

    Sergey Koroidov & Johannes Messinger

  4. Institut für Biologie, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, D-10099, Germany

    Athina Zouni

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  1. Nicholas K. Sauter
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Nicholas K. Sauter or Vittal K. Yachandra.

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Sauter, N., Echols, N., Adams, P. et al. No observable conformational changes in PSII. Nature 533, E1–E2 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature17983

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