Synthetic Biology: Researchers engineer entire
protein-making complex for first time
(July 30, 2015) Researchers
have artificially engineered a complete ribosome—the cell-based machine that
translates mRNA into proteins—in the laboratory.
The ability to engineer the ribosome not only could help
scientists understand how the protein-maker works, but it also could endow the
ribosome with new functions. For drug discovery and basic research, engineered
ribosomes could create nonnatural proteins or even nonprotein polymers that
would be difficult or impossible for native ribosomes to make.
Alexander Mankin of the University of Illinois, Chicago;
Michael C. Jewett of Northwestern University; and colleagues designed,
engineered, and characterized the artificial ribosome, which they call Ribo-T
(Nature 2015, DOI: 10.1038/nature14862).
“It’s an impressive body of work that will enable the
directed or random evolution of ribosomes with modifications that allow
synthetic amino acids to be more efficiently incorporated, or even to expand
the genetic code,” comments ribosome assembly specialist Katrin Karbstein of
Scripps Research Institute Florida.