Density functional calculations of (55)Mn, (14)N and (13)C electron paramagnetic resonance parameters support an energetically feasible model system for the S(2) state of the oxygen-evolving complex of photosystem II.

Metal and ligand hyperfine couplings of a previously suggested, energetically feasible Mn(4)Ca model cluster (SG2009(-1)) for the S(2) state of the oxygen-evolving complex (OEC) of photosystem II (PSII) have been studied by broken-symmetry density functional methods and compared with other suggested structural and spectroscopic models. This was carried out explicitly for different spin-coupling patterns of the S=1/2 ground state of the Mn(III)(Mn(IV))(3) cluster. By applying spin-projection techniques and a scaling of the manganese hyperfine couplings, computation of the hyperfine and nuclear quadrupole coupling parameters allows a direct evaluation of the proposed models in comparison with data obtained from the simulation of EPR, ENDOR, and ESEEM spectra. The computation of (55)Mn hyperfine couplings (HFCs) for SG2009(-1) gives excellent agreement with experiment. However, at the current level of spin projection, the (55)Mn HFCs do not appear sufficiently accurate to distinguish between different structural models. Yet, of all the models studied, SG2009(-1) is the only one with the Mn(III) site at the Mn(C) center, which is coordinated by histidine (D1-His332). The computed histidine (14)N HFC anisotropy for SG2009(-1) gives much better agreement with ESEEM data than the other models, in which Mn(C) is an Mn(IV) site, thus supporting the validity of the model. The (13)C HFCs of various carboxylates have been compared with (13)C ENDOR data for PSII preparations with (13)C-labelled alanine.