Talk abstracts

Talk on Friday 05:20-05:35pm submitted by Michael Widom

Efficiency of riboswitch terminator folding during transcription

Michael Widom (Department of Physics, Carnegie Mellon University), Ben Sauerwine (Department of Physics, Carnegie Mellon University)

Abstract:
Riboswitches regulate expression of bacterial genes through the formation of specific secondary structures in their 5' UTRs. We employ kinetic Monte Carlo simulation to model the structure formation during transcription of transcriptional terminators and Shine-Dalgarno sequesterers. Transcriptional terminators fold with higher efficiency than Shine-Dalgarno sequesterers. We suggest this difference is the result of natural selection for efficient folding of terminator hairpins which must fold quickly and reliably in order to successfully terminate transcription. In contrast, Shine-Dalgarno sequesterers act at the time of translation, reducing the selective pressure for high folding efficiency.

Keywords: Riboswitch, termination, Folding kinetics