Steady-state and femtosecond photoinduced processes of blepharismins bound to alpha-crystallin

The interaction of blepharismin (BP) and oxyblepharismin (OxyBP) with bovine alpha-crystallin (BAC) has been studied both by steady-state and femtosecond spectroscopy, with the aim of assessing the possible phototoxicity of these compounds toward the eye tissues. We showed that these pigments form with BAC potentially harmful ground-state complexes, the dissociation constants of which have been estimated to be 6 +/- 2 mumol L(-1) for OxyBP and 9 +/- 4 mumol L(-1) for BP. Irradiation with steady-state visible light of solutions of blepharismins in the presence of BAC proved to induce a quenching of both the pigment and the intrinsic protein fluorescences. These effects were tentatively rationalized in terms of structural changes of alpha-crystallin. On the other hand, femtosecond transient absorption spectroscopy was used to check the occurrence of any type I photoactivity of oxyblepharismin bound to alpha-crystallin. The existence of a particular type of fast photoinduced reaction, not observed in former studies with human serum albumin but present in the natural oxyblepharismin-binding protein, could here be evidenced but no specific reaction was observed during the first few nanoseconds after excitation. Partial denaturation of alpha-crystallin was however found to alter the excited-state behaviour of its complex with oxyblepharismin, making it partly resemble that of free oxyblepharismin in solution.