SOLUTION OF THE RIBOSOME RIDDLE - HOW THE RIBOSOME SELECTS THE CORRECT AMINOACYL-TRANSFER RNA OUT OF 41 SIMILAR CONTESTANTS

Three tRNA binding sites, the A, P and E sites, have been demonstrated on ribosomes of bacterial, archaebacterial and eukaryotic origin. In all these cases the first and the third site, the A and the E site, are allosterically coupled in the sense of a negative co-operativity. Therefore, the allosteric three-site model seems to be a generally valid description of the ribosomal elongation phase, where in a cycle of reactions the nascent peptide chain is prolonged by one amino acid. The molecular concept of the allosteric three-site model explains the astonishing ability of the ribosome to select the correct substrate out of a large number of very similar substrates, and it provides a framework within which the mechanisms of the elongation factors could be understood.