[Seminar] "How simple peptides enhance RNA polymerase ribozyme function" by Dr. Shunsuke Tagami

Speaker: Dr. Shunsuke Tagami, Unit Leader, RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research

Title: How simple peptides enhance RNA polymerase ribozyme function

Abstract:

Protein synthesis in modern biology depends on multiple elaborate machineries (eg. ribosomes, mRNA, tRNA, etc.). However, at the early stage of the evolution of life the translation system must have emerged as a much simpler system (or just one small ribozyme). Therefore, the peptides synthesized at that time were probably simple non-coded peptides. It is still elusive how such simple peptides could be functional without specific sequences encoded by the genetic code. To answer this question we tested if simple non-coded peptides have any benefit on function and survival of an RNA polymerase ribozyme, a model ribozyme for RNA replicase in the RNA world.
[1] Tagami S et al. (2017) Nature Chemistry 9:325–332.

Website: https://www.bdr.riken.jp/en/research/labs/tagami-s/index.html