Concept
Version 7
Created by Boundless
Processes of the Light-Dependent Reactions
Photosystems I & II
A photosystem consists of a light-harvesting complex and a reaction center. Pigments in the light-harvesting complex pass light energy to two special chlorophyll a molecules in the reaction center. The light excites an electron from the chlorophyll a pair, which passes to the primary electron acceptor. The excited electron must then be replaced. In (a) photosystem II, the electron comes from the splitting of water, which releases oxygen as a waste product. In (b) photosystem I, the electron comes from the chloroplast electron transport chain.
Source
Boundless vets and curates high-quality, openly licensed content from around the Internet. This particular resource used the following sources:
"OpenStax College, The Light-Dependent Reactions of Photosynthesis. October 16, 2013."
http://cnx.org/content/m44448/latest/Figure_08_02_07ab.png
OpenStax CNX
CC BY 3.0.