The Photosystems, Volume 11

Foreword to Volume 11 by Lord Porter, OM, FRS. Preface by J. Barber.

List of Contributors.

Obituaries: R. Hill by F.R. Whatley.

M. Avron by A. Jagendorf and Z. Gromet-Elhanan.

D. DeVault by M. Seibert.

Chapters 1. An Introduction to Plant and Bacterial Photosystems (R. Cogdell and R. Malkin). 2. Thermodynamics of Light Energy Conversion (L.N. Bell and N.D. Gudkov). 3. Energy Transfer and Trapping in Photosystem II (G. Renger). 4. The Molecular Biology of Photosystem II (J.M. Erickson and J-D. Rochaix). 5. Oxygen Evolution (A.W. Rutherford, J-L. Zimmermann and A. Boussac). 6. Protein Engineering of Photosystem II (H.B. Pakrasi and W.F.J. Vermaas). 7. Thermoluminescence in the Study of Photosystem II (I. Vass and Y. Inoue). 8. Dynamics of Photosystem II: Mechanism of Photoinhibition and Recovery Processes (O. Prasil, N. Adir and I. Ohad). 9. Herbicides of Photosystem II (W. Oettmeier). 10. Heat Shock Proteins in Plants: An Approach to Understanding the Function of Plastid Heat Shock Proteins (E. Kruse and K. Kloppstech). 11. Photosystem I: Composition, Organization and Structure (O. Almog, G. Shoham and R. Nechushtai). 12. Energy Transfer and Trapping in Photosystem I (P. Sétif). 13. Molecular Biology of Photosystem I (Donald A. Bryant). Subject Index.

There is very little in this eleventh volume of Topics in Photosynthesis which could have been written when the first volume was published fifteen years ago. Advances over the last decade have been spectacular, most particularly in our understanding of the photosystems that is the subject of this volume. After a comparative introducution of bacterial and plant photosystems, the book begins with a consideration of what is theoretically possible in energy conversion. This is followed by light harvesting in photosystems II, followed by its molecular biology, protein engineering, thermoluminescence, photoinhibition, the effect of herbicides and heat shock, and, most important function of all and one about which so little is yet understood at the molecular level, the process by which it evolves oxygen. The last three chapters deal with the equivalent processes of photosystem I. The whole volume tells the story of a natural system of incredible ingenuity and complexity, but which as the chapters unfold, is seen to be within our grasp and eventual ability to comprehend.