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Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology 9, 266 (1 April 2008) | doi:10.1038/nrm2382

Gene expression: Translation in real time

Arianne Heinrichs

Because the dynamics of ribosomes are stochastic, it is necessary to analyse a single ribosome to study the step-by-step translation of messenger RNA. Wen et al. stalled a single ribosome at the 5|[prime]|-end of a hairpin-shaped mRNA molecule, which was held by optical tweezers.