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Updated: Apr 15, 2026

Fluorescence Recovery after Photobleaching of Yellow Fluorescent Protein Tagged p62 in Aggresome-like Induced Structures
Published on: March 26, 2019
A Light-Induced Reaction with Oxygen Leads to Chromophore Decomposition and Irreversible Photobleaching in GFP-Type
Bella L Grigorenko1,2, Alexander V Nemukhin1,2, Igor V Polyakov1
1†Department of Chemistry, M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory 1/3, Moscow, 119991, Russian Federation.
Abstract:
Photobleaching and photostability of proteins of the green fluorescent protein (GFP) family are crucially important for practical applications of these widely used biomarkers. On the basis of simulations, we propose a mechanism for irreversible bleaching in GFP-type proteins under intense light illumination. The key feature of the mechanism is a photoinduced reaction of the chromophore with molecular oxygen (O2) inside the protein barrel leading to the chromophore's decomposition. Using quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) modeling we show that a model system comprising the protein-bound Chro(-) and O2 can be excited to an electronic state of the intermolecular charge-transfer (CT) character (Chro(•)···O2(-•)). Once in the CT state, the system undergoes a series of chemical reactions with low activation barriers resulting in the cleavage of the bridging bond between the phenolic and imidazolinone rings and disintegration of the chromophore.
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