Structural analysis of the photosynthetic membrane from Ectothiorhodospira halochloris
Bacterial photosynthetic membranes contain, apart from lipids and electron transport components, reaction centre (RC) and light harvesting (LH) polypeptides as the main components. The RC-LH complexes in Rhodopseudomonas viridis membranes are known since quite seme time to form a hexagonal lattice structure in vivo; hence this membrane attracted the particular attention of electron microscopists. Contrary to previous claims in the literature we found, however, that 2-D periodically organized photosynthetic membranes are not a unique feature of Rhodopseudomonas viridis. At least five bacterial species, all bacteriophyll b - containing, possess membranes with the RC-LH complexes regularly arrayed. All these membranes appear to have a similar lattice structure and fine-morphology. The lattice spacings of the Ectothiorhodospira haloohloris, Ectothiorhodospira abdelmalekii and Rhodopseudomonas viridis membranes are close to 13 nm, those of Thiocapsa pfennigii and Rhodopseudomonas sulfoviridis are slightly smaller (∼12.5 nm).