The biochemistry and molecular biology of chlorophyll breakdown

2017/08/23 by Benke Kuai, Junyi Chen, Stefan Hörtensteiner · 338 citations
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · #Biochemistry #Biology #Botany #Cell biology #Chlorophyll #Enzyme #Horticultural and Viticultural Research #Metabolic pathway #Pheophorbide A #Photosynthetic Processes and Mechanisms #Plant Gene Expression Analysis #Ripening #Tetrapyrrole

paper · pdf · doi:10.1093/jxb/erx322

published in Journal of Experimental Botany 69(4), 751-767 (Oxford University Press)

openalex publication_date 2017/08/23 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04

Abstract

Chlorophyll breakdown is one of the most obvious signs of leaf senescence and fruit ripening. The resulting yellowing of leaves can be observed every autumn, and the color change of fruits indicates their ripening state. During these processes, chlorophyll is broken down in a multistep pathway, now termed the 'PAO/phyllobilin' pathway, acknowledging the core enzymatic breakdown step catalysed by pheophorbide a oxygenase, which determines the basic linear tetrapyrrole structure of the products of breakdown that are now called 'phyllobilins'. This review provides an update on the PAO/phyllobilin pathway, and focuses on recent biochemical and molecular progress in understanding phyllobilin-modifying reactions as the basis for phyllobilin diversity, on the evolutionary diversity of the pathway, and on the transcriptional regulation of the pathway genes.

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