title: Plasmonic bio-sensing for the Fenna-Matthews-Olson complex.
abstract: We study theoretically the bio-sensing capabilities of metal nanowire surface plasmons. As a specific example, we couple the nanowire to specific sites (bacteriochlorophyll) of the Fenna-Matthews-Olson (FMO) photosynthetic pigment protein complex. In this hybrid system, we find that when certain sites of the FMO complex are subject to either the suppression of inter-site transitions or are entirely disconnected from the complex, the resulting variations in the excitation transfer rates through the complex can be monitored through the corresponding changes in the scattering spectra of the incident nanowire surface plasmons. We also find that these changes can be further enhanced by changing the ratio of plasmon-site couplings. The change of the Fano lineshape in the scattering spectra further reveals that "site 5" in the FMO complex plays a distinct role from other sites. Our results provide a feasible way, using single photons, to detect mutation-induced, or bleaching-induced, local defects or modifications of the FMO complex, and allows access to both the local and global properties of the excitation transfer in such systems.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, National Chung Hsing University, Taichung 402, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Guang-Yin
authors.initials: GY
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Center for Emergent Matter Science, RIKEN, Wako-shi, Saitama 351-0198, Japan.
authors.forename: Neill
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Lambert
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Yen-An
authors.initials: YA
authors.lastname: Shih
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Meng-Han
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan.|Physics Division, National Center for Theoretical Sciences, Hsinchu, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Yueh-Nan
authors.initials: YN
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Center for Emergent Matter Science, RIKEN, Wako-shi, Saitama 351-0198, Japan.|Physics Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1040, USA.
authors.forename: Franco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Nori
mesh_terms: D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics; D015374:Biosensing Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D004735:Energy Transfer; D045342:Light-Harvesting Protein Complexes / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics; D008670:Metals / Q000737:chemistry; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D049329:Nanostructures / Q000737:chemistry; D020349:Surface Plasmon Resonance / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins; C086320:FMO bacteriochlorophyll protein, Bacteria; D045342:Light-Harvesting Protein Complexes; D008670:Metals