Regulation of hydrogen production by uncouplering CCCP in green algae chlamydomonas reinhardtii

Uncouplering carbonylcyanide-m-chlorophenylhydrazone [CCCP] can markedly inhibit the photochemical activity of photosystem II and repress the rate of photosynthetic oxygen evolution. As a result, the anaerobic condition can promptly induce hydrogenase expression and accelerate hydrogen photoproduction under the continuous illumination by Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. When C. reinhardtii cultured in TAP medium and treated with 0, 5 and 15 μmol/L CCCP under the continuous illumination, the photochemical activity of algae could not be obviously inhibited. But 15 and 20 μmol/L CCCP could markedly depress the photochemical activity and substantial amount of hydrogen gas was photoproduced. The photochemical activity of C. reinhardtii cultured with TAP-S at all concentrations of CCCP under the continuous illumination was distinctly inhibited and the cultures photoproduced hydrogen gas rapidly. The algae of C. reinhardtii cultured with TAP and TAP-S medium, different concentrations of CCCP altered the process of hydrogen metabolism and the efficiency of utilization and conversion of solar energy by the center of PS II.