Assembly of plastid-encoded chlorophyll binding proteins of photosystem II (PSII) was studied in etiolated barley seedlings and isolated etioplasts and either the absence or presence of de novo chlorophyll synthesis. De novo assembly of reaction center complexes in etioplasts was characterized by immunological analysis of protein complexes solubilized from inner etioplast membranes and separated in sucrose density gradients. Previously characterized membrane protein complexes from chloroplasts were utilized as molecular mass standards for sucrose density gradient separation analysis. In etiolated seedlings, induction of chlorophyll a synthesis resulted in the accumulation of D1 in a dimeric PSII reaction center (RCII) complex. In isolated etioplasts, de novo chlorophyll a synthesis directed accumulation of D1 precursor in a monomeric RCII precomplex that also included D2 and cytochrome b 559 . Chlorophyll a synthesis that was chemically prolonged in darkness neither increased the yield of RCII monomers nor directed assembly of RCII dimers in etioplasts. We therefore conclude that in etioplasts, assembly of the D1 precursor in monomeric RCII precomplexes precedes chlorophyll a -triggered accumulation of reaction center monomers.
INTRODUCTIONIn higher plants grown in darkness, formation of the photosynthetic apparatus is contingent on the light-dependent induction of chloroplast development. Light regulates synthesis of the chlorophyll a precursor protochlorophyllide a and is used as a substrate to enable the enzymatic re duction of protochlorophyllide a into chlorophyllide a by NADPH-protochlorophyllide oxidoreductase (POR) (von Wettstein et al., 1995;Fujita, 1996). The subsequent enzymatic esterification of chlorophyllide a to chlorophyll a has been found to be the decisive step for the accumulation of the chlorophyll a binding apoproteins P700A/P700B, CP47, CP43, and D1 of photosystems I and II (PSI and PSII), because binding of chlorophyll a to the apoproteins confers stability against proteolysis (Eichacker et al., 1996a). Similarly, other chlorophyll-associated proteins, including the nuclear-encoded chlorophyll a / b binding light-harvesting proteins (Bennett, 1981;Kuttkat et al., 1998), PSI chlorophyll proteins in Chlamydomonas (Herrin et al., 1992), and bacteriochlorophyll binding proteins of photosynthetic bacteria, are stabilized by chlorophyll (Dierstein, 1983). As shown indirectly by spectroscopy and by photochemical activity measurements, binding of chlorophyll a occurs within the first hour after illumination of etiolated barley (Egnéus et al., 1972;Wellburn and Hampp, 1979;Burkey, 1986;Ohashi et al., 1989;Franck, 1993); however, no direct evidence for chlorophyll a -dependent photosystem assembly has been reported.Chlorophyll a -dependent accumulation of plastidencoded chlorophyll a binding proteins is regulated at the cotranslational and post-translational levels (Klein and Mullet, 1986;van Wijk and Eichacker, 1996;Edhofer et al., 1998;Mühlbauer and Eichacker, 1998). During the first hour of illum...