What's the rationale behind the similarities between chlorophyll and hemoglobin?

[Cory Geesaman]

My best guess at the moment is that since chlorophyll is designed to channel light via entanglement to turn it into usable energy that the similar molecular machinery can be used to turn slight vibrations into enough energy to eject the Oxygen in hemoglobin - but I don't actually have a clue and it's mostly pseudoscience which pops up when I do a search on Google.  Does anyone know the answer to this?

[Skyler Gordon]

It could be that both molecules are extremely important for biosynthesis and have similar structure for stability sake. The density of conjugated double bonds and circular (multi-arch) structure could simply be a manifestation of molecular stability.

While chlorophyll is a pigment, it isn't the only pigment in the light harvesting complex. And while the exact reason oxygen diffuses from hemoglobin the way it does may not be known, I don't know for fact, the light harvesting complex is probably much the same.

You may want to look into the amount of oxygen hemoglobin can hold at different concentrations. The curve is sigmoidal and may help you make a theory. 

-SG

On Tue, Sep 12, 2017 at 5:15 PM Cory Geesaman <co...@geesaman.com> wrote:

My best guess at the moment is that since chlorophyll is designed to channel light via entanglement to turn it into usable energy that the similar molecular machinery can be used to turn slight vibrations into enough energy to eject the Oxygen in hemoglobin - but I don't actually have a clue and it's mostly pseudoscience which pops up when I do a search on Google.  Does anyone know the answer to this?

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[Rikke Rasmussen]

I suspect the primary explanation for the similarity in form is due to the complexing of a metal ion at the reaction center (iron for heme, magnesium for chlorophyll), which is central to the functionality of both molecules. I found this review paper from 1980 that explores the similarities in quite a bit of detail:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1048480/pdf/jmedgene00123-0008.pdf

As well as a brief, pop-sci summary of same:

http://www.quirkyscience.com/comparing-hemoglobin-and-chlorophyll/

On Wed, Sep 13, 2017 at 2:09 PM, Skyler Gordon <skg...@gmail.com> wrote:

It could be that both molecules are extremely important for biosynthesis and have similar structure for stability sake. The density of conjugated double bonds and circular (multi-arch) structure could simply be a manifestation of molecular stability.

While chlorophyll is a pigment, it isn't the only pigment in the light harvesting complex. And while the exact reason oxygen diffuses from hemoglobin the way it does may not be known, I don't know for fact, the light harvesting complex is probably much the same.

You may want to look into the amount of oxygen hemoglobin can hold at different concentrations. The curve is sigmoidal and may help you make a theory. 

-SG

On Tue, Sep 12, 2017 at 5:15 PM Cory Geesaman <co...@geesaman.com> wrote:

My best guess at the moment is that since chlorophyll is designed to channel light via entanglement to turn it into usable energy that the similar molecular machinery can be used to turn slight vibrations into enough energy to eject the Oxygen in hemoglobin - but I don't actually have a clue and it's mostly pseudoscience which pops up when I do a search on Google.  Does anyone know the answer to this?

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[Cory Geesaman]

Thanks.

On Wednesday, September 13, 2017 at 6:09:00 PM UTC-4, Rikke wrote:

I suspect the primary explanation for the similarity in form is due to the complexing of a metal ion at the reaction center (iron for heme, magnesium for chlorophyll), which is central to the functionality of both molecules. I found this review paper from 1980 that explores the similarities in quite a bit of detail:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1048480/pdf/jmedgene00123-0008.pdf

As well as a brief, pop-sci summary of same:

http://www.quirkyscience.com/comparing-hemoglobin-and-chlorophyll/

On Wed, Sep 13, 2017 at 2:09 PM, Skyler Gordon <skg...@gmail.com> wrote:

It could be that both molecules are extremely important for biosynthesis and have similar structure for stability sake. The density of conjugated double bonds and circular (multi-arch) structure could simply be a manifestation of molecular stability.

While chlorophyll is a pigment, it isn't the only pigment in the light harvesting complex. And while the exact reason oxygen diffuses from hemoglobin the way it does may not be known, I don't know for fact, the light harvesting complex is probably much the same.

You may want to look into the amount of oxygen hemoglobin can hold at different concentrations. The curve is sigmoidal and may help you make a theory. 

-SG

On Tue, Sep 12, 2017 at 5:15 PM Cory Geesaman <co...@geesaman.com> wrote:

My best guess at the moment is that since chlorophyll is designed to channel light via entanglement to turn it into usable energy that the similar molecular machinery can be used to turn slight vibrations into enough energy to eject the Oxygen in hemoglobin - but I don't actually have a clue and it's mostly pseudoscience which pops up when I do a search on Google.  Does anyone know the answer to this?

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[Nathan McCorkle]

I thought hemoglobin was just a pH responsive chelator, while
chlorophyll was more like an antenna+diode... as for rationale... can
you really ask that of evolution?

[Sonia Arrison]

Super interesting! Thanks for the links, Rikke.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/diybio/CALZhpzJanN_-tsK7pTA_0ziHV5qJ9L6qZP3y5rdKW2rLrqPojA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Rikke Rasmussen]

Actually, that Quirky Science thing is pretty atrocious - ignore that, just read the paper.

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[Cory Geesaman]

Chlorophyll is definitely like an antenna+diode - which is what got me thinking Hemoglobin might be shaped like it is so that the Oxygen can be knocked off by lower energy processes (i.e. you have something bump it mechanically or electrically just the right way and it ejects either an Oxygen molecule or a highly reactive monoatomic Oxygen molecule and something else is ready to make use of it.)  Still a bit unclear on if this is the case or not though.