Influence of carbon supply on the stimulation of light-saturated photosynthesis by blue light in Laminaria saccharina: implications for the mechanism of carbon acquisition in higher brown algae

In saturating irradiances of red light, photosynthesis of Laminaria saccharina (L.) Lamouroux was stimulated by low irradiances of continuous blue light only when the supply of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) was limiting. The degree of this stimulation was inversely proportional to the logarithm of the concentration of free CO₂, whether this was adjusted by varying the total DIC or the pH at a given DIC concentration. The final pH reached in a closed system was higher in blue light than in red light. Both acetazolamide and ethoxyzolamide suppressed the responses to blue light almost completely, but reduced photosynthesis in red light by only 30%. Buffering the pH of the seawater also suppressed the stimulation of photosynthesis by blue light without affecting the photosynthetic rate in red light. The transient stimulation of O₂ evolution by a blue light pulse was not accompanied by a corresponding increase in CO₂ consumption. These observations could be explained if, in analogy to the mechanism proposed for Ectocarpus (Schmid, Mills & Dring 1996, Plant Cell and Environment 19,373–382, this issue, accompanying paper), photosynthesis was supported by a blue-light-activated release of CO₂ from an internal store. We suggest that the store is located in the vacuoles of the cortical tissue of the blades. The main photosynthetic tissue, however, is in the overlying meristoderm, and blue-light-activated mobilization of the store could stimulate O₂ evolution only if periplasmic carbonic anhydrase was available to facilitate CO₂ uptake from the cortex.