Light harvesting is the study of materials and molecules that capture photons of solar light. This includes studies to better understand the light-harvesting properties of photosynthetic organisms or those of artificial systems that are designed and synthesised to promote photochemical reactions or produce solar fuels.

What are light-harvesting reactions?

The overall function of light-dependent reactions is to convert solar energy into chemical energy in the form of NADPH and ATP. ... Pigments in the light-harvesting complex pass light energy to two special chlorophyll a molecules in the reaction center.

What do proteins do in light-harvesting?

The protein components serve as backbones that organize the light-harvesting pigments in a way that ensures that the absorbed light energy is efficiently transferred from the pigment first excited into the photosynthetic reaction center, where charge separation takes place.