Red-band resonance Raman spectroscopy of chlorophyll cofactors in photosynthetic proteins

Only recently have various methodological approaches been successful in producing Raman spectra of chlorophylls resonantly with their lowest singlet electronic transitions (Q(y) bands). The information content of these new approaches and their impact on current research on photosynthetic proteins are discussed. It is shown that resonance methods can contribute very valuable data on the dynamics of the primary photophysical events, while preresonance methods are yielding many new data on the structural bases of these events at atomic level. (C) 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.