Biophysical Journal 1: 539-550 (1961)
© 1961 the Biophysical Society

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The Long Wave Length Forms of Chlorophyll a

ABSTRACT

When Euglena gracilis is cultured with light of low intensity (ca. 250 ft-c), an absorption band at 695 mµ is formed in an amount equal to about 20 per cent of the total chlorophyll absorption in this red region. An equally large proportion of C_a695 is observed in Ochromonas danica, irrespective of light intensity. Other algae tested appear to contain approximately 3 to 5 per cent of their chlorophyll as C_a695; this proportion does not increase as strikingly with lowering of the light intensity as it does in Euglena. C_a695 bleaches more readily than the other chlorophyll forms both reversibly, in whole cells, and irreversibly, in homogenates. Cells containing a large proportion of C_a695 have a fluorescence maximum at 708 mµ, as contrasted to the 687 mµ maximum in other algae. Occasionally, old cultures of Euglena contain cells with an absorption band at approximately 710 mµ. This absorption band is quite stable in aqueous extracts; when the pigment is transferred to ether an equivalent amount of pheophytin a is found to be present. Conditions leading to the formation of the 710 mµ absorption band are not yet known.