Mimicking Ribosomal Unfolding of RNA Pseudoknot in a Protein Channel.

ABSTRACT: Pseudoknots are a fundamental RNA tertiary structure with important roles in regulation of mRNA translation. Molecular force spectroscopic approaches such as optical tweezers can track the pseudoknot's unfolding intermediate states by pulling the RNA chain from both ends, but the kinetic unfolding pathway induced by this method may be different from that in vivo, which occurs during translation and proceeds from the 5' to 3' end. Here we developed a ribosome-mimicking, nanopore pulling assay for dissecting the vectorial unfolding mechanism of pseudoknots. The pseudoknot unfolding pathway in the nanopore, either from the 5' to 3' end or in the reverse direction, can be controlled by a DNA leader that is attached to the pseudoknot at the 5' or 3' ends. The different nanopore conductance betw

SUBMITTER: Zhang X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4886178 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature