Kinetic Studies of the Assembly of Plant Light Harvesting Complex II

Photosynthesis relies on the correct assembly of pigment binding proteins within the thylakoid membrane. Yet, very little is known about the folding of such membrane proteins. The biochemical difficulties connected with these highly hydrophobic proteins are reflected in the low number of crystal structures available for membrane proteins to date. One of the few available, however, is that of LCHII (1). In addition, LHCII is one of only a handful of membrane proteins that can be regenerated in vitro to a native-like conformation (2,3). These two features make it a good candidate for studying its folding and assembly kinetics. Here, a preliminary study on the assembly kinetics of LHCII as a f…