Doukas A G, Junnarkar M R, Alfano R R, Callender R H, Balogh-Nair V
Biophys J. 1985 Jun;47(6):795-8. doi: 10.1016/S0006-3495(85)83983-7.
The picosecond fluorescence kinetics and quantum yield from bovine rhodopsin were measured in the 5-40 degrees K range. The fluorescence rise and decay times are faster than our resolution of 15 ps (full width at half maximum) over this entire temperature range. The size of the observed emission was also temperature independent, and we find that the upper limit of rhodopsin's fluorescence quantum yield to be phi f approximately equal to 10(-5). Replacing all of rhodopsin's exchangeable protons with deuterons by suspending rhodopsin in D2O had no effect on either the kinetics of the emission or the value of the quantum yield. Our data provide strong confirmation of the idea that the first step in the visual process is an excited-state cis-to-trans isomerization about the C11-C12 double bond of retinal.
在5至40开尔文的温度范围内测量了牛视紫红质的皮秒荧光动力学和量子产率。在整个温度范围内，荧光上升和衰减时间比我们15皮秒（半高宽）的分辨率更快。观察到的发射大小也与温度无关，并且我们发现视紫红质荧光量子产率的上限为φf约等于10^(-5)。通过将视紫红质悬浮在重水中，用氘取代视紫红质所有可交换质子，对发射动力学或量子产率的值均无影响。我们的数据有力地证实了视觉过程的第一步是围绕视网膜C11-C12双键的激发态顺反异构化这一观点。
