On wavelength-dependent exciton lifetime distributions in reconstituted CP29 antenna of the photosystem II and its site-directed mutants

To provide more insight into the excitonic structure and exciton lifetimes of the wild type (WT) CP29 complex of photosystem II, we measured high-resolution (low temperature) absorption, emission, and hole burned spectra for the A2 and B3 mutants, which lack chlorophylls a612 and b614 (Chls), respectively. Experimental and modeling results obtained for the WT CP29 and A2/B3 mutants provide new insight on the mutation-induced changes at the molecular level and shed more light on energy transfer dynamics. Simulations of the A2 and B3 optical spectra, using the second-order non-Markovian theory, and comparison with improved fits of WT CP29 optical spectra provide more insight into their excitonic structure, mutation induced changes, and frequency-dependent distributions of exciton lifetimes (T1). A new Hamiltonian obtained for WT CP29 reveals that deletion of Chls a612 or b614 induces changes in the site energies of all remaining Chls. Hamiltonians obtained for A2 and B3 mutants are discussed in the context of the energy landscape of chlorophylls, excitonic structure, and transfer kinetics. Our data suggest that the lowest exciton states in A2 and B3 mutants are contributed by a611(57%), a610(17%), a615(15%) and a615(58%), a611(20%), a612(15%) Chls, respectively, although other compositions of lowest energy states are also discussed. Finally, we argue that the calculated exciton decay times are consistent with both the hole-burning and recent transient absorption measurements. Wavelength-dependent T1 distributions offer more insight into the interpretation of kinetic traces commonly described by discrete exponentials in global analysis/global fitting of transient absorption experiments.