The ribosome is one of the most complex molecular machines in the cell, said Alexander Mankin, professor and director of the Center for Pharmaceutical Biotechnology UIC. He is responsible for the production of all proteins in the cell and in bacteria, is one of the main objectives of antibiotics.Understanding how signals are generated and transmitted within the ribosome, Mankin said, could one day lead to better antibiotics.
Under normal conditions, the catalytic center of the ribosome can accept any of the 20 natural amino acids, which are then added to the growing protein chain.
However, if the protein synthesized ribosome to regulate the presence of an antibiotic, the catalytic center rejects some or all of the amino acids. Therefore, the synthesis stops regulatory protein, and antibiotic resistance genes are activated.
In previous studies, Mankin and his research team has identified some residues of ribosomal RNA that interact with the peptide in growth control, thus serving the function of peptides sensors.
This is one of the strategies used by pathogenic bacteria exposed to antibiotics to control the expression of genes for resistance to antibiotics, said Mankin.
More recent research has found at least one of the Mankin signaling pathways in the ribosome. He and his colleagues found that the presence of regulatory protein as it does in the ribosome changes the properties of the catalytic center of the ribosome is.
Mankin and his research team – Haripriya Ramu, and Nora Vazquez-Laslop Dorota Klepacki – attended Qing Dai and Joseph Piccirilli, University of Chicago and Ronald Micura University of Innsbruck in Austria.