Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

RNA biophysics

A three-state balancing act

Nature volume 499, pages 289–290 (2013)Cite this article

Subjects

How do pathogens survive temperature variations? At a molecular level, one bacterial species seems to regulate gene expression in response to temperature through structural equilibria in corresponding RNA sequences. See Letter p.355

In bacteria, many messenger RNA molecules carry a regulatory segment called a riboswitch. Specific binding of small ligand molecules, such as adenine, to this segment determine whether the riboswitch mRNA will be translated into a protein1,2,3,4. On page 355 of this issue, Reining et al.5 show that regulation of gene expression through such 'riboswitching' is coupled to temperature sensing. The authors investigate the adenine-sensitive riboswitch from the pathogenic bacterium Vibrio vulnificus6, and demonstrate that efficient RNA regulation at different temperatures — those of the bacterium's marine habitat and its human host — requires a change in the riboswitch's structural behaviour from a two-state pattern to a three-state one.Footnote 1

Your institute does not have access to this article

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1: Three states of a riboswitch.

Notes

  1. *This article and the paper under discussion5 were published online on 10 July 2013.

References

  1. Breaker, R. R. Mol. Cell 43, 867–879 (2011).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Serganov, A. & Patel, D. J. Annu. Rev. Biophys. Biomol. Struct. 41, 343–370 (2012).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Serganov, A. & Nudler, E. Cell 152, 17–24 (2013).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Liberman, J. A. & Wedekind, J. E. Wiley Interdisc. Rev. RNA 3, 369–384 (2012).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Reining, A. et al. Nature 499, 355–359 (2013).

    ADS  CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Lemay, J.-F. et al. PLoS Genet. 7, e1001278 (2011).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Garst, A. D., Edwards, A. L. & Batey, R. T. Cold Spring Harb. Perspect. Biol. 3, a003533 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Al-Hashimi, H. M. & Walter, N. G. Curr. Opin. Struct. Biol. 18, 321–329 (2008).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Zhang, J., Lau, M. W. & Ferré-D'Amaré, A. R. Biochemistry 49, 9123–9131 (2010).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Rieder, U., Kreutz, C. & Micura, R. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 107, 10804–10809 (2010).

    ADS  CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Kortmann, J. & Narberhaus, F. Nature Rev. Microbiol. 10, 255–365 (2012).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Kellenberger, C. A., Wilson, S. C., Sales-Lee, J. & Hammond, M. C. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 135, 4906–4909 (2013).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Sinha, J., Reyes, S. J. & Gallivan, J. P. Nature Chem. Biol. 6, 464–470 (2010).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ronald Micura is at the Institute of Organic Chemistry and the Center for Molecular Biosciences, Leopold Franzens University, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria.,

    Ronald Micura

Authors
  1. Ronald Micura
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ronald Micura.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Micura, R. A three-state balancing act. Nature 499, 289–290 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12410

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12410

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing