Cyclic dissociation into stable subunits and re-formation of ribosomes during bacterial growth

Raymond O.R. Kaempfer*, Matthew Meselson, Heschel J. Raskas

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

64 Scopus citations

Abstract

Studies of the distribution of isotopic labels among ribosomes and ribosomal subunits following transfer of a growing bacterial culture from a heavy- to a light-isotopes medium show that: 1. (1) During growth ribosomes frequently undergo subunit exchange, presumably by dissociation into their 30 s and 50 s subunits and re-formation from a pool of free subunits. 2. (2) Bibosomal subunits are stable: they remain intact during growth and are continuously, recycled through ribosomes. On the basis of these results, it is suggested that ribosomes must dissociate into their subunits between successive rounds of translation.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)277-289
Number of pages13
JournalJournal of Molecular Biology
Volume31
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - 28 Jan 1968
Externally publishedYes

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