Young Min Rhee

Dynamics of Electronically Excited Protein-Chromophore Complexes: From Theoretical Perspectives

Electronic excitations in protein-chromophore complexes and their subsequent relaxations participate importantly in many biological processes including photosynthesis, bioluminescence, and photo-switching. Following their dynamics also presents various challenges in both experimental and theoretical chemistry. In this presentation, we will briefly overview my lab’s recent efforts in tackling these problems from the theory side. Among the three biological processes mentioned in the above, we will primarily focus on the excitation energy transfers in photosynthetic systems. We will show how an all-atom style semiclassical approach can be adopted to trace the nonadiabatic energy transfer process and what new information this approach can provide. Limitations of the approach will be discussed, together with recent theoretical improvements for overcoming such limitations. Future prospects for studying electronically excited protein systems will also be discussed as concluding remarks.