Studies on the Assembly of Ribosomes in vitro
This extract was created in the absence of an abstract.
Excerpt
Ribosomes are complex cell organelles consisting of ribosomal RNA (rRNA) and a number of different protein molecules. One of the major questions one can ask about the ribosome is how these component molecules are assembled into the final organized structure. As described in the preceding article, we have recently succeeded in developing a reconstitution system that, under well-defined conditions, produces physically and functionally intact 30 S ribosomes from free 16 S RNA and free 30 S ribosomal proteins from E. coli (Traub and Nomura, 1968). Reconstituted 30 S particles synthesized under optimal conditions were found to be indistinguishable from the original 30 S ribosomes with respect to their sedimentation coefficient, their protein composition, and their capacity to bind aminoacyl-tRNA and to synthesize protein in response to messenger RNA (mRNA). Furthermore, this total reconstitution system proved to be independent of the presence of additional macromolecular structures, such as enzymes, membranes, pre-existing...
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↵* Present address: Department of Biology, University of California, LaJolla, California.
