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Phycobilisomes play a crucial role in the light-harvesting mechanisms of cyanobacteria, red algae and glaucophytes, but the molecular mechanism of their regulation is largely unknown. In the cyanobacterium, Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803, we identified slr0244 as a phycobilisome-related gene using phylogenetic profiling analysis, a method used to predict gene function based on comparative genomics. To investigate the physiological function of the slr0244 gene, we characterized slr0244 mutants spectroscopically. Disruption of the slr0244 gene impaired state transition, a process by which the distribution of light energy absorbed by the phycobilisomes between two photosystems is regulated in response to the changes in light conditions. The Slr0244 protein seems to act in the process of state transition, somewhere at or downstream of the sensing step of the redox state of the plastoquinone (PQ) pool. These findings, together with past reports describing the interaction of this gene product with thioredoxin and glutaredoxin, suggest that the slr0244 gene is a novel state-transition regulator that integrates the redox signal of PQ pools with that of the photosystem I-reducing side. The protein has two universal stress protein (USP) motifs in tandem. The second motif has two conserved cysteine residues found in USPs of other cyanobacteria and land plants. These redox-type USPs with conserved cysteines may function as redox regulators in various photosynthetic organisms. Our study also shows the efficacy of phylogenetic profiling analysis in predicting the function of cyanobacterial genes that have not been annotated so far.
Fukunaga et al. (Mon,) studied this question.