Photoreception and photomovements of microorganisms

Abstract

Many freely motile microorganisms can perceive and transduce external photic stimuli to the motor apparatus, eventually moving, by means of various behavioural strategies, into environments in which the illumination conditions are the most favourable for their life. In different microorganisms, a wide range of chromophores operate as light detectors, each of them set in a special molecular pocket that, in its turn, can be linked to another component of the transduction chain. The diverse photosensors are organized in special (and in many cases dedicated) photoreceptor units or subcellular organelles. The main molecular mechanisms connecting the early event of photon absorption to the formation of the signalling state down to the dark steps of the transduction chain are discussed in a selected number of case examples. The possible importance of an intensive multidisciplinary approach to these problems in an evolutionary perspective is finally briefly outlined.