Photobiology articles within Nature

Featured

  • Article |

    By using in vivo ultrafast TA spectroscopy, extraction of electrons directly from photoexcited PSI and PSII in cyanobacterial cells using exogenous electron mediators is demonstrated.

    • Tomi K. Baikie
    • , Laura T. Wey
    •  & Jenny Z. Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    One picosecond after photoactivation, isomerized retinal pulls away from half of its numerous interactions with its binding pocket, and the excess of the photon energy is released through an anisotropic protein breathing motion in the direction of the extracellular space.

    • Thomas Gruhl
    • , Tobias Weinert
    •  & Valerie Panneels

  • News Feature |

    There is more to the eye than rods and cones — the discovery of a third photoreceptor is rewriting the visual rulebook.

    • Corie Lok

  • News & Views |

    How is light perceived? The answer that might immediately come to mind is, through the eyes. Fly larvae, however, can 'feel' light using specialized neurons embedded under the cuticle encasing their bodies. See Article p.921

    • Paul A. Garrity

  • Article |

    Light sensing outside the eyes is common in many animals but is usually confined to specialized organs. Here, the entire body wall of the fruitfly larva is found to be tiled with blue- and ultraviolet-light sensing neuronal dendrites, which are essential for the larva's innate light-avoidance behaviour. The phototransduction machinery used by these neurons is distinct from other Drosophila photoreceptor molecules but similar to a system recently identified in nematode neurons.

    • Yang Xiang
    • , Quan Yuan
    •  & Yuh Nung Jan

  • Letter |

    Phytochromes regulate numerous photoresponses in plants and microorganisms through their ability to photointerconvert between a red-light-absorbing, ground state (Pf) and a far-red-light-absorbing, photoactivated state (Pfr). The structures of several phytochromes as Pf have been determined previously; here, the three-dimensional solution structure of the bilin-binding domain as Pfr is described. The results shed light on the structural basis for photoconversion to the activated Pfr form.

    • Andrew T. Ulijasz
    • , Gabriel Cornilescu
    •  & Richard D. Vierstra

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