Excitation energy transfer in light-harvesting system: Effect of initial state

TL;DR

This paper investigates how different initial excitation states affect energy transfer efficiency in the FMO light-harvesting complex, considering decoherence, fluctuations, and optimizing transport conditions.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive analysis of initial state effects on energy transfer in FMO, extending beyond the commonly assumed initial exciton in BChla 1.

Findings

Initial states significantly influence energy transfer efficiency.

Optimized decoherence rates enhance transport performance.

Fluctuations in site energies and couplings impact energy transfer dynamics.

Abstract

The light-harvesting is a problem of long interest. It becomes active again in recent years stimulated by suggestions of quantum effects in energy transport. Recent experiments found evidence that BChla 1 and BChla 6 are the first to be excited in the Fenna-Matthews-Olson(FMO) protein, theoretical studies, however, are mostly restricted to consider the exciton in BChla 1 initially. In this paper, we study the energy transport in the FMO complex by taking different initial states into account. Optimizations are performed for the decoherence rates as to maximal transport efficiency. Dependence of the energy transfer efficiency on the initial states is given and discussed. Effects of fluctuations in the site energies and couplings are also examined.