Chlororespiration and the process of carotenoid biosynthesis.

The plastoquinone pool during dark adaptation is reduced by endogenous reductants and oxidized at the expense of molecular oxygen. We report here on the redox state of plastoquinone in darkness, using as an indicator the chlorophyll fluorescence kinetics of whole cells of a Chlamydomonas reinhardtii mutant strain lacking the cytochrome b(6)f complex. When algae were equilibrated with a mixture of air and argon at 1.45% air, plastoquinol oxidation was inhibited whereas mitochondrial respiration was not. Consequently, mitochondrial oxidases cannot be responsible for the oxygen consumption linked to plastoquinol oxidation. Plastoquinol oxidation in darkness turned out to be sensitive to n-propyl gallate (PG) and insensitive to salicylhydroxamic acid (SHAM), whereas mitochondrial respiration was sensitive to SHAM and PG. Thus, both PG treatment and partial anaerobiosis allow to draw a distinction between an inhibition of plastoquinol oxidation and an inhibition of mitochondrial respiration, indicating the presence of a plastoquinol:oxygen oxidoreductase. The possible identification of this oxidase with an oxidase involved in carotenoid biosynthesis is discussed in view of various experimental data.