2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
The origin of light harvesting function in the photosynthetic antenna complex
| Project/Area Number |
15K18562
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
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| Allocation Type | Multi-year Fund |
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| Research Field |
Plant molecular biology/Plant physiology
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| Research Institution | Tohoku University |
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Principal Investigator |
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| Research Collaborator |
MINAGAWA Jun
MIYAGISHIMA Shin-ya
FUJIWARA Takayuki
KAWATA Masakado
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| Project Period (FY) |
2015-04-01 – 2017-03-31
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| Keywords | 葉緑体 / 植物 / 進化 / 光合成 / 集光アンテナ / LHC |
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| Outline of Final Research Achievements |
Eukaryotic photosynthetic organisms have evolved light harvesting complex (LHC) as a device of efficient light capture for photosynthesis. Since the studies on LHC has been focused on the ones in green plants, function of LHC in ancestral chloroplasts has been elusive.
In this study, we attempted to generate LHC mutants of a red alga, which still possesses ancestral characters of plants, and successfully obtained mutant lines lacking all the functional LHC genes in the genomes. In addition, we found that mutants showed significantly lower growth rates compared to wild type under a certain growth condition. These results indicate that eukaryotic photosynthetic antenna have evolved as a trait dispensable but conditionally advantageous for growth.
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| Free Research Field |
共生進化学
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