Research report 2015 - Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine
Protein folding – why speed matters
Authors
Leidel, Sebastian A.
Departments
Max-Planck-Forschungsgruppe für RNA Biologie
DOI
10.17617/1.XSummary
Proteins are the workhorses of our cells. To fulfill their roles they need to adopt a functional conformation. Scientists have now experimentally determined how fast proteins are made and have shown that the correct speed is critical for functional folding. Perturbing translation leads to protein aggregates. This can cause severe developmental defects in mice. Their brain cells receive the wrong differentiation signal due to protein stress. These results answer a fundamental question of molecular biology and have far reaching consequences for neurodegenerative diseases and biotechnology.