1. The conformation of a conserved stem-loop structure in ribosomal RNA
- Author
-
Hans A. Heus and van Knippenberg Ph
- Subjects
Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy ,Base Sequence ,Stereochemistry ,5.8S ribosomal RNA ,Molecular Sequence Data ,RNA ,General Medicine ,Ribosomal RNA ,Biology ,Stem-loop ,Nucleic Acid Denaturation ,Molecular biology ,18S ribosomal RNA ,Conserved sequence ,5S ribosomal RNA ,Structural Biology ,RNA, Ribosomal ,28S ribosomal RNA ,Nucleic Acid Conformation ,Thermodynamics ,Molecular Biology - Abstract
The RNA of small ribosomal subunits contains a conserved stem-loop structure near the 3' end. Characteristics for the hairpins are: (a) a nine-basepairs stem: (b) a conserved A-UU-G junction in the stem: (c) a conserved sequence Gm6(2)AM6(2)A sequence in the loop (except yeast mitochondria and mutants from bacteria). We are using UV-optics, micro-calorimetry and 500 MHz-NMR to investigate fragments of about 50 nucleotides cleaved from the 3' ends of small ribosomal subunit RNA's by bacteriocins. Our preliminary conclusions are: (1) Dimethylation of the adenines in the loop destabilizes the hairpin because of an increased stacking; (2) melting of the hairpin starts at the ends as well as in the middle at the A-UU-G junction; (3) basepair substitutions have an unexpectedly large effect on thermal stability.
- Published
- 1983