Researchers shed new light on carboxysomes in key discovery that could boost photosynthesis

A research team led by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has discovered how carboxysomes—carbon-fixing structures found in some bacteria and algae—work. The breakthrough could help scientists redesign and repurpose the structures to enable plants to convert sunlight into more energy, paving the way for improved photosynthesis efficiency, potentially increasing the global food supply and mitigating global warming.

Phys.org

While we understand how photosynthesis works, ostensibly, not all the biological structural components have been explained.

For cyanobacteria, it is the carboxysomes, critical to CO2 processing, that have defied the attempts of most to analyze.

Now, King's College London researchers have used cryo electron microscopy to create a working atomic model of them.

#Microscopy #Prokaryotes #Cyanobacteria #Photosynthesis #Carboxysomes #CO2 #Biology #Science #SciComm

https://www.cell.com/structure/fulltext/S0969-2126(23)00084-9