Mechanism & regulation of translation I Flashcards
what is the central dogma?
theory stating that genetic information flows only in one direction, from DNA to RNA, to protein or RNA directly to protein
protein synthesis
- crucial for cell growth, proliferation and survival
- expensive process for the cell, therefore tightly regulated
what can protein synthesis regulation do?
control overall rates of proteinsynthesis and modulate the expression of specific transcripts
what can proteinsynthesis be inhibited by?
cell stresses and withdrawal of nutrients; serum deprivation, temperature shock, DNA damage, viral infection, hypoxia, cytokine treatment
prokaryotes
- polycistronic
- normally unstable
- translation can occur on nascent transcripts
eurkaryotes
- normally monocistronic
- capped and polyadenylated
- 5’ and 3’ UTR
what is the structure of CAP?
- found at the 5’ end of all cellular mRNAs
- seals end of mRNA protecting it from nuclease digestion
- landing pad for elF4E
what is the process of capping of newly synthesised mRNAs?
- removal of 5’ terminal phosphate (triphosphatase)
- addition of 5’ terminal GMP (guanylyl transferase)
- methylation of guanine base (guanine- 7methyl transferase)
- methylation of ribose (in some cases)
what is polyadenylation?
- poly A tail found at 3’ end of mRNAs
- protects mRNA from enzymatic degradation
- aids in transcription termination, export of mRNA from the nucleus and translation
what are the stages in the 3’ polyadenylation of newly synthesised mRNAs?
- recognition of AUAAA sequences by specificity componens RNA cleavage by cleavage factors
- initial poly(A) polymerisation by poly(A) polymerase; followed by binding of poly(A) binding protein (PABP)
- more poly(A) polymerisation and binding of more PABP
what are the general characteristics of tRNA molecules?
- single RNA strand of approx 80 nucleotides
- helps decode mRNA sequence into a protein
- function at specific sites in the ribosome during translation
- aminoacyl tRNA synthestase links amino acid to 3’ end of acceptor arm to produce an aminoacyl-tRNA
ribosome structure
large and small subunits
contain 50% proteinsand 50% rRNAs (by mass)
function of 80s ribosomes
- small and large subunits bind together during initiation
- translation takes place in the cavity between the two subunits
- peptidyl transferase activity associated with the large 60s subunit
what are the three binding sites for tRNA in ribosomes?
E; exit site
P; peptidyl-RNA binding site
A; aminoacyl-tRNA binding site
other facts
- translation must go fast enough to supply protein but slow enough to avoid too many errors
- error rate; 1 in 10^4 incorrect aa
- ribosomes add 20 aa/second to a polypeptide chain
- proteinsynthesis is energetically expensive
CAP-dependent protein synthesis; initiation
- small ribosomal subunit and initiatior tRNA bind, recognition of CAP, scanning to start AUG codon
- ternanry complex binds large ribosomal unit