Seminar

Throwing a spanner in the ribosomal works

Daniel Wilson, PhD

The ribosome is the protein synthesizing machine in the cells and as such is one of the major targets within the bacterial cell for antibiotics. In addition, many other small molecules as well as protein factors can interact with the ribosome under specific conditions to regulate or modulate translation and thus influence gene expression. The Wilson group utilizes biochemical and structural biology techniques to investigate ribosome-ligand complexes, providing fundamental insight into translation regulation. We are particularly interested in understanding how antibiotics interact with the ribosome to inhibit translation and how bacteria attain resistance to such diverse antibiotic classes. In addition, the translation of specific amino acids sequences by the ribosome leads to translational stalling, which has implications for expression of defined subset of cellular proteins.