The acclimation of Phaeodactylum tricornutum to blue and red light does not influence the photosynthetic light reaction but strongly disturbs the carbon allocation pattern.

Diatoms are major contributors to the aquatic primary productivity and show an efficient acclimation ability to changing light intensities. Here, we investigated the acclimation of Phaeodactylum tricornutum to different light quality with respect to growth rate, photosynthesis rate, macromolecular composition and the metabolic profile by shifting the light quality from red light (RL) to blue light (BL) and vice versa. Our results show that cultures pre-acclimated to BL and RL exhibited similar growth performance, photosynthesis rates and metabolite profiles. However, light shift experiments revealed rapid and severe changes in the metabolite profile within 15 min as the initial reaction of light acclimation. Thus, during the shift from RL to BL, increased concentrations of amino acids and TCA cycle intermediates were observed whereas during the BL to RL shift the levels of amino acids were decreased and intermediates of glycolysis accumulated. Accordingly, on the time scale of hours the RL to BL shift led to a redirection of carbon into the synthesis of proteins, whereas during the BL to RL shift an accumulation of carbohydrates occurred. Thus, a vast metabolic reorganization of the cells was observed as the initial reaction to changes in light quality. The results are discussed with respect to a putative direct regulation of cellular enzymes by light quality and by transcriptional regulation. Interestingly, the short-term changes in the metabolome were accompanied by changes in the degree of reduction of the plastoquinone pool. Surprisingly, the RL to BL shift led to a severe inhibition of growth within the first 48 h which was not observed during the BL to RL shift. Furthermore, during the phase of growth arrest the photosynthetic performance did not change. We propose arguments that the growth arrest could have been caused by the reorganization of intracellular carbon partitioning.