IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/nature/v452y2008i7187d10.1038_nature06716.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Following translation by single ribosomes one codon at a time

Author

Listed:
  • Jin-Der Wen

    (University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA)

  • Laura Lancaster

    (Cell, and Developmental Biology, and Center for Molecular Biology of RNA, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064, USA)

  • Courtney Hodges

    (Biophysics Graduate Group, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA)

  • Ana-Carolina Zeri

    (Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory, Caixa Postal 6192, Campinas SP 13083-970, Brazil)

  • Shige H. Yoshimura

    (Graduate School of Biostudies, Kyoto University, Yoshida-honmachi, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, 606-8501, Japan)

  • Harry F. Noller

    (Cell, and Developmental Biology, and Center for Molecular Biology of RNA, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064, USA)

  • Carlos Bustamante

    (University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
    Biophysics Graduate Group, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
    Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA)

  • Ignacio Tinoco

    (University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA)

Abstract

We have followed individual ribosomes as they translate single messenger RNA hairpins tethered by the ends to optical tweezers. Here we reveal that translation occurs through successive translocation-and-pause cycles. The distribution of pause lengths, with a median of 2.8 s, indicates that at least two rate-determining processes control each pause. Each translocation step measures three bases—one codon—and occurs in less than 0.1 s. Analysis of the times required for translocation reveals, surprisingly, that there are three substeps in each step. Pause lengths, and thus the overall rate of translation, depend on the secondary structure of the mRNA; the applied force destabilizes secondary structure and decreases pause durations, but does not affect translocation times. Translocation and RNA unwinding are strictly coupled ribosomal functions.

Suggested Citation

  • Jin-Der Wen & Laura Lancaster & Courtney Hodges & Ana-Carolina Zeri & Shige H. Yoshimura & Harry F. Noller & Carlos Bustamante & Ignacio Tinoco, 2008. "Following translation by single ribosomes one codon at a time," Nature, Nature, vol. 452(7187), pages 598-603, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:452:y:2008:i:7187:d:10.1038_nature06716
    DOI: 10.1038/nature06716
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature06716
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/nature06716?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chris H. Hill & Lukas Pekarek & Sawsan Napthine & Anuja Kibe & Andrew E. Firth & Stephen C. Graham & Neva Caliskan & Ian Brierley, 2021. "Structural and molecular basis for Cardiovirus 2A protein as a viral gene expression switch," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 12(1), pages 1-16, December.
    2. Shuting Yan & Qiyao Zhu & Swati Jain & Tamar Schlick, 2022. "Length-dependent motions of SARS-CoV-2 frameshifting RNA pseudoknot and alternative conformations suggest avenues for frameshifting suppression," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-13, December.
    3. Yosuke Ito & Yuhei Chadani & Tatsuya Niwa & Ayako Yamakawa & Kodai Machida & Hiroaki Imataka & Hideki Taguchi, 2022. "Nascent peptide-induced translation discontinuation in eukaryotes impacts biased amino acid usage in proteomes," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-16, December.
    4. Chen Bao & Mingyi Zhu & Inna Nykonchuk & Hironao Wakabayashi & David H. Mathews & Dmitri N. Ermolenko, 2022. "Specific length and structure rather than high thermodynamic stability enable regulatory mRNA stem-loops to pause translation," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-14, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:452:y:2008:i:7187:d:10.1038_nature06716. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.