By 1960, when most of the stereochemistry of chlorophyll a was known, Robert Burns Woodward published a total synthesis of the molecule. Īfter initial work done by German chemist Richard Willstätter spanning from 1905 to 1915, the general structure of chlorophyll a was elucidated by Hans Fischer in 1940. The presence of magnesium in chlorophyll was discovered in 1906, and was the first detection of that element in living tissue. History Ĭhlorophyll was first isolated and named by Joseph Bienaimé Caventou and Pierre Joseph Pelletier in 1817. Two types of chlorophyll exist in the photosystems of green plants: chlorophyll a and b. Hence chlorophyll-containing tissues appear green because green light, diffusively reflected by structures like cell walls, is less absorbed. Conversely, it is a poor absorber of green and near-green portions of the spectrum. Chlorophyll allow plants to absorb energy from light.Ĭhlorophylls absorb light most strongly in the blue portion of the electromagnetic spectrum as well as the red portion.
Its name is derived from the Greek words χλωρός, khloros ("pale green") and φύλλον, phyllon ("leaf"). There are several types of chlorophyll, but all share the chlorin magnesium ligand which forms the right side of this diagram.Ĭhlorophyll (also chlorophyl) is any of several related green pigments found in cyanobacteria and in the chloroplasts of algae and plants.
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