Latest Ribosomal protein Stories
Proteins, the workhorses of the body, can have more than one function, but they often need to be very specific in their action or they create cellular havoc, possibly leading to disease. Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have uncovered how an enzyme co-factor can bestow specificity on a class of proteins with otherwise nonspecific biochemical activity. The protein in question helps in the assembly of ribosomes, large macromolecular machines that...
In the beginning – of the ribosome, the cell's protein-building workbench – there were ribonucleic acids, the molecules we call RNA that today perform a host of vital functions in cells. And according to a new analysis, even before the ribosome's many working parts were recruited for protein synthesis, proteins also were on the scene and interacting with RNA. This finding challenges a long-held hypothesis about the early evolution of life. The study appears in the journal PLoS ONE....
In the beginning – of the ribosome, the cell's protein-building workbench – there were ribonucleic acids, the molecules we call RNA that today perform a host of vital functions in cells. And according to a new analysis, even before the ribosome's many working parts were recruited for protein synthesis, proteins also were on the scene and interacting with RNA. This finding challenges a long-held hypothesis about the early evolution of life. The "RNA world" hypothesis, first promoted in...
As part of a joint research effort with the University of Michigan, scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have for the first time defined the structure of one of the cell's most basic engines, which is required for cell growth, as it assembles from its components.The study reveals a series of redundant mechanisms that assure production of these critical structures while avoiding any missteps that could lead to their destruction or to the production of incorrect...
A Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator from Albany, New York, and an HHMI international research scholar from Buenos Aires, Argentina have combined their expertise to identify two peculiar features of the protein-making machinery of the parasite that causes Chagas disease. Their findings could help scientists develop a safe and effective drug for the disease, whose cardiac complications kill up to 30 percent of those infected. The unusual structure of the ribosome, published online...
