Stabilization Mechanism of Initiator Transfer RNA in the Small Ribosomal Subunit from Coarse-Grained Molecular Simulations

Abstract

Proteins play a variety of roles in biological phenomena in cells. Proteins are synthesized by a ribosome, which is a large molecular complex composed of proteins and nucleic acids. Among many molecules involved in the process of protein synthesis, transfer RNA (tRNA) is one of the essential molecules. In this study, coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations were performed to understand how the tRNA molecule is stabilized in the ribosome, and the free energy along the dissociation path of the tRNA was calculated. We found that some ribosomal proteins, which are components of the ribosome, are involved in the stabilization of the tRNA. The positively charged amino acid residues in the C-terminal region of the ribosomal proteins are particularly important for the stabilization. These findings contribute to our understanding of the molecular evolution of protein synthesis in terms of the ribosome, which is a universal component of life.TOC Graphic