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Updated: Apr 15, 2026

In Vitro Reconstitution of Light-harvesting Complexes of Plants and Green Algae
Published on: October 10, 2014
Regeneration of Light-Harvesting Complexes via Dynamic Replacement of Photodegraded Chromophores
Hanyu Zhang1, Jing Pan1, Srijana Ghimire1
1†School of Mechanical Engineering and ‡Department of Chemistry, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907, United States.
Abstract:
All-synthetic molecular donor-acceptor complexes are designed, which are capable of counteracting the effect of photoinduced degradation of donor chromophores. Anionic gallium protoporphyrin IX (GaPP) and semiconducting carbon nanotube (CNT) are used as a model donor-acceptor complex, which is assembled using DNA oligonucleotides. The GaPP-DNA-CNT complex produces an anodic photocurrent in a photoelectrochemical cell, which steadily decays due to photo-oxidation. By modulating the chemical environment, we showed that the photodegraded chromophores may be dissociated from the complex, whereas the DNA-coated carbon nanotube acceptors are kept intact. Reassociation with fresh porphyrins leads to the full recovery of GaPP absorption and photocurrents. This strategy could form a basis for improving the light-harvesting performance of molecular donor-acceptor complexes and extending their operation lifetime.
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