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Adaptation To Blue Light In Marine Synechococcus Requires Mpeu, An Enzyme With Similarity To Phycoerythrobilin Lyase Isomerases, Wendy M. Schluchter, Rania Mohamed Mahmoud, Joseph Sanfilippo, Adam A. Nguyen, Johann A. Strnat, Frédéric Partensky, Laurence Garczarek, Nabil Kassem, David M. Kehoe
Adaptation To Blue Light In Marine Synechococcus Requires Mpeu, An Enzyme With Similarity To Phycoerythrobilin Lyase Isomerases, Wendy M. Schluchter, Rania Mohamed Mahmoud, Joseph Sanfilippo, Adam A. Nguyen, Johann A. Strnat, Frédéric Partensky, Laurence Garczarek, Nabil Kassem, David M. Kehoe
Biological Sciences Faculty Publications
Marine Synechococcus has successfully adapted to environments with different light colors, which likely contributes to this genus being the second most abundant group of microorganisms worldwide. Populations of Synechococcus that grow in deep, blue ocean waters contain large amounts of the blue-light absorbing chromophore phycourobilin (PUB) in their light harvesting complexes (phycobilisomes). Here, we show that all Synechococcus strains adapted to blue light possess a gene called mpeU. MpeU is structurally similar to phycobilin lyases, enzymes that ligate chromophores to phycobiliproteins. Interruption of mpeU caused a reduction in PUB content, impaired phycobilisome assembly and reduced growth rate more strongly in …