First ’snapshots’ of the electronic structure of a manganese complex related to water-splitting in photosynthesis
from Umeå University - Together with a large international research team, Johannes Messinger of Umeå University in Sweden has taken another step toward an understanding of photosynthesis and developing artificial photosynthesis. With a combination of a x-ray free-electron laser and spectroscopy, the team has managed to see the electronic structure of a manganese complex, a chemical compound related to how photosynthesis splits water. The experiments used the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), which is a free-electron x-ray laser facility at Stanford University in the US. The wavelength of the laser is roughly the same as the breadth of an atom, and each pulse of light lasts 50 femtoseconds (10-15). This is an extremely short interval of time: there are more femtoseconds in one second than there are seconds in a person's life. Such extremely short wavelengths and short light pulses constitute ideal conditions for imaging chemical reactions with atomic resolution at room temperature while the chemical reactions are ongoing. The research group has previously used LCLS to perform structural analyses of isolated photosynthesis complexes from plants' photosystem II at room temperature.
