Rainer Uhl

All-trans retinal constitutes the functional chromophore in Chlamydomonas rhodopsin

Orientation of the green alga Chlamydomonas in light (phototaxis and stop responses) is controlled by a visual system with a rhodopsin as the functional photoreceptor. Here, we present evidence that in Chlamydomonas wild-type cells all-trans retinal is the predominant isomer and that it is present in amounts similar to that of the rhodopsin itself.The ability of different retinal isomers and analog compounds to restore photosensitivity in blind Chlamydomonas cells (strain CC2359) was tested by means of flash-induced light scattering transients or by measuring phototaxis in a taxigraph. All-trans retinal reconstitutes behavioral light responses within one minute, whereas cis-isomers require at least 50 x longer incubation times, suggesting that the retinal binding site is specific for all-trans retinal. Experiments with 13-demethyl(dm)-retinal and short-chained analogs reveal that only chromophores with a beta-methyl group and at least three double bonds in conjugation with the aldehyde mediate function. Because neither 13-dm-retinal, nor 9,12-phenylretinal restores a functional rhodopsin, a trans/13-cis isomerisation seems to take place in the course of the activation mechanism. We conclude that with respect to its chromophore, Chlamydomonas rhodopsin bears a closer resemblence to bacterial rhodopsins than to visual rhodopsins of higher animals.

ESR spin-label studies of lipid-protein interactions in membranes.

Lipid spin labels have been used to study lipid-protein interactions in bovine and frog rod outer segment disc membranes, in (Na+, K+)-ATPase membranes from shark rectal gland, and in yeast cytochrome oxidase-dimyristoyl phosphatidylcholine complexes. These systems all display a two component ESR spectrum from 14-doxyl lipid spin-labels. One component corresponds to the normal fluid bilayer lipids. The second component has a greater degree of motional restriction and arises from lipids interacting with the protein. For the phosphatidylcholine spin label there are effectively 55 +/- 5 lipids/200,000-dalton cytochrome oxidase, 58 +/- 4 mol lipid/265,000 dalton (Na+, K+)-ATPase, and 24 +/- 3 and 22 +/- 2 mol lipid/37,000 dalton rhodopsin for the bovine and frog preparations, respectively. These values correlate roughly with the intramembrane protein perimeter and scale with the square root of the molecular weight of the protein. For cytochrome oxidase the motionally restricted component bears a fixed stoichiometry to the protein at high lipid:protein ratios, and is reduced at low lipid:protein ratios to an extent which can be quantitatively accounted for by random protein-protein contacts. Experiments with spin labels of different headgroups indicate a marked selectivity of cytochrome oxidase and the (Na+, K+)-ATPase for stearic acid and for cardiolipin, relative to phosphatidylcholine. The motionally restricted component from the cardiolipin spin label is 80% greater than from the phosphatidylcholine spin label for cytochrome oxidase (at lipid:protein = 90.1), and 160% greater for the (Na+, K+)-ATPase. The corresponding increases for the stearic acid label are 20% for cytochrome oxidase and 40% for (Na+, K+)-ATPase. The effective association constant for cardiolipin is approximately 4.5 times greater than for phosphatidylcholine, and that for stearic acid is 1.5 times greater, in both systems. Almost no specificity is found in the interaction of spin-labeled lipids (including cardiolipin) with rhodopsin in the rod outer segment disc membrane. The linewidths of the fluid spin-label component in bovine rod outer segment membranes are consistently higher than those in bilayers of the extracted membrane lipids and provide valuable information on the rate of exchange between the two lipid components, which is suggested to be in the range of 10(6)-10(7) s-1.

Sub-second turnover of transducin GTPase in bovine rod outer segments. A light scattering study.

A fast, regenerative light scattering signal from bovine ROS, the PA‐signal, reflects the light‐induced, transient activation of transducin. Its rate of recovery depends on the number of photolysed rhodopsin molecules, indicating that rhodopsin deactivation and not GTPase activity is rate limiting in our in vitro system. When rhodopsin deactivation is accelerated (in the presence of NH2OH), PA‐signal recovery is also accelerated. A GTPase turnover number of more than 2 s−1 (at 37°C) can be derived from these experiments. This is more than one order of magnitude faster than the GTPase rates so far described in the literature and is rapid enough for a physiological shut‐off mechanism. The fast GTPase is attributed to a highly intact disk stack, which never releases transducin into the free aqueous space.

Calcium regulates the rate of rhodopsin disactivation and the primary amplification step in visual transduction.

The kinetics of the light‐induced activation of transducin as well as the subsequent disactivation process can be monitored by means of a specific light scattering transient PA. In this communication it is demonstrated that the rate of transducin disactivation is calcium dependent, increasing when the calcium concentration is decreased. As a consequence of the accelerated recovery in low calcium, the time to the peak of the transducin activation process is shortened and the gain of the primary amplification step, i.e. the number of transducin molecules activated per bleached rhodopsin, is reduced. Experiments using hydroxylamine as an artificial quencher of rhodopsin activity suggest that calcium acts upon rhodopsin kinase and not upon the rate of the GTPase. This would indicate that calcium may control visual adaptation not only by regulating guanine cyclase activity, but also by affecting the primary step in the transduction cascade, the rhodopsin‐transducin coupling

The photochemical cycle of halorhodopsin: absolute spectra of intermediates obtained by flash photolysis and fast difference spectra measurements.

Results of experiments using flash photolysis and fast difference spectroscopy suggest an extended version of the earlier published scheme of the photochemical cycle of halorhodopsin. Detailed experimental verification of the suggested photocycle is given. Due to the high resolution of the time-resolved difference spectra, absolute spectra of the intermediates in the photocycle were derived, allowing the interpretation of complex kinetic absorbance changes.

Probing visual transduction in a plant cell: Optical recording of rhodopsin-induced structural changes from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii

Light scattering studies of vertebrate rod cells have greatly aided our understanding of the visual transduction process. This technique has now been successfully applied to study visual transduction in a unicellular alga. Flash-induced light scattering changes have been recorded which are repeatable, graded with photon exposure, and adaptive. They appear on a timescale of 15-1,000 ms and correlate kinetically with flash-induced movement responses. The responsible photoreceptor is a rhodopsin. Evidence is provided for the ability of the organism to count single photons.

Lipid-protein interactions in frog rod outer segment disc membranes. Characterization by spin labels

Freely-diffusing phospholipid spin labels have been employed to study rhodopsin-lipid interactions in frog rod outer segment disc membranes. Examination of the ESR spectra leads us to the conclusion that there are two motionally distinguishable populations of lipid existing in frog rod outer segment membranes over a wide physiological temperature range. Each of the spin probes used shows a two-component electron spin resonance (ESR) spectrum, one component of which is motionally restricted on the ESR timescale, and represents between 33 and 40% of the total integrated spectral intensity. The second spectral component which accounts for the remainder of the spectral intensity possesses a lineshape characteristic of anisotropic motion in a lipid bilayer, very similar in shape to that observed from the same spin labels in dispersions of whole extracted frog rod outer segment lipid. The motionally restricted spectral component is attributed to those spin labels in contact with the surface of rhodospin, while the major component is believed to originate from spin labels in the fluid lipid bilayer region of the membranes. Calculations indicate that the motionally restricted lipid is sufficient to cover the protein surface. This population of lipids is shown here and elsewhere (Watts, A., Volotovski, I.D. and Marsh, D. (1979) Biochemistry 18, 5006-5013) to be by no means rigidly immobilized, having motion in the 20 ns time regime as opposed to motions in the one nanosecond time regime found in the fluid bilayer. Little selectivity for the motionally restricted population is observed between the different spin-labelled phospholipid classes nor with a spin-labelled fatty acid or sterol.

A polychromatic flash photolysis apparatus (PFPA)

A wide variety of biologically relevant chemical intermediates have been identified and characterised by their spectral properties. When rapid kinetics, i.e. rapid changes in these spectral properties are studied, the equipment designed for these studies (flash photolysis-, T-jump apparatus) usually allows only the registration of intensity changes of the monitoring light beam at one particular wavelength. Quite frequently, however, particularly in biological systems, the reactions of interest are too complex to be fully understood using single wavelength techniques. We have therefore designed and built a flash photolysis apparatus which permits the simultaneous recording of absorbance changes at 32 wavelengths, freely selectable between 300 and 1000 nm, as well as changes in fluorescence, luminescence, birefringence and light scattering. The apparatus, which we have called Polychromatic Flash Photolysis Apparatus (PFPA), acquires up to 8000 difference spectra per second with an amplitude resolution of better than 0.0001 absorbance unit. Data acquisition and activation of an actinic xenon flash unit occurs under computer control. The same computer is responsible for data storage, handling and graphic display. This communication describes the PFPA, its performance, and, as a demonstration of its potential usefulness, its application to the measurement of the light driven photocycle of bacterial rhodopsin, the proton pumping protein of Halobacterium halobium.

A simple and rapid procedure for the isolation of intact bovine rod outer segments (ROS)

A method is described which allows the rapid isolation and purification of intact rod outer segments (ROS) from cattle eyes. It requires very fresh retinal material and can be completed within less than 2 h of the death of the animals. Cattle eyes are dissected in the usual manner, the retinae are isolated and the ROS are separated from the rest of the retina by gentle vortexing and filtration through a nylon mesh. The resulting crude ROS suspension is purified on a discontinuous sucrose density gradient. Two fractions are obtained, the major one consisting of mostly intact ROS, the minor one of RIS-ROS, i.e. of ROS which are still connected to part of their inner segment. The ROS are washed once and can be stored on ice for several days without loosing their intact plasma membrane. They can be transformed to leaky ROS by a quick freeze/thawing cycle or, if one wants unobstructed access to the interdiskal space, they can be subjected to a mild lysis treatment. The resulting ROS material is characterised using light microscopy, electron microscopy, light scattering, gel electrophoresis and absorption spectroscopy. It contains unusually low levels of 48k-protein and very high levels of G-protein. The latter cannot be washed out in the presence of GTP-gamma-S, even in the case of leaky ROS.

Rapid transducin deactivation in intact stacks of bovine rod outer segment disks as studied by light scattering techniques. Arrestin requires additional soluble proteins for rapid quenching of rhodopsin catalytic activity.

In photoreceptors of the living retina both activation and deactivation of transducin must occur in less than 1 s. In ROS preparations used for in vitro studies, however, deactivation takes minutes. This is due to the fact that activated transducin is released into the free aqueous space, whereby GTPase activity and consequent deactivation of the protein are slowed down, and due to the dilution of soluble ROS proteins involved in the quenching of rhodopsin activity. In this paper, using a convenient, non‐invasive light scattering assay, we demonstrate that in an intact stack of disks, where active transducin stays membrane associated and is rapidly deactivated, the activity of rhodopsin can also be quenched in the time range of seconds when soluble ROS proteins are supplemented. Arrestin, the 48 kDa protein of the photoreceptor, is one of the proteins required for rapid recovery, however, it requires the synergistic action of other soluble proteins (besides rhodopsin kinase) in order to exert its effect: When arrestin is included in the reaction mixture without the ‘helper protein(s)’, it cannot speed recovery, and when a mixture of soluble proteins is added which lacks arrestin, there is also no effect. The nature and identity of this (these) helper protein(s) are still unclear.