IJMS, Vol. 25, Pages 7947: Martini 3 Coarse-Grained Model for the Cofactors Involved in Photosynthesis

IJMS, Vol. 25, Pages 7947: Martini 3 Coarse-Grained Model for the Cofactors Involved in Photosynthesis

International Journal of Molecular Sciences doi: 10.3390/ijms25147947

Authors: Maria Gabriella Chiariello Rubi Zarmiento-Garcia Siewert-Jan Marrink

As a critical step in advancing the simulation of photosynthetic complexes, we present the Martini 3 coarse-grained (CG) models of key cofactors associated with light harvesting (LHCII) proteins and the photosystem II (PSII) core complex. Our work focuses on the parametrization of beta-carotene, plastoquinone/quinol, violaxanthin, lutein, neoxanthin, chlorophyll A, chlorophyll B, and heme. We derived the CG parameters to match the all-atom reference simulations, while structural and thermodynamic properties of the cofactors were compared to experimental values when available. To further assess the reliability of the parameterization, we tested the behavior of these cofactors within their physiological environments, specifically in a lipid bilayer and bound to photosynthetic complexes. The results demonstrate that our CG models maintain the essential features required for realistic simulations. This work lays the groundwork for detailed simulations of the PSII-LHCII super-complex, providing a robust parameter set for future studies.