DATE2026.07.21 #Press Releases

All's Well That Ends Well in Mitochondrial Translation

Disclaimer: machine translated by DeepL which may contain errors.

― Elucidation of the Molecular Mechanisms Underlying the Termination of Protein Synthesis and Ribosome Reuse ―

Abstract

The Iwasaki RNA Systems Biochemistry Institute at RIKEN, where Shintaro Iwasaki is a Senior Staff Member, Taisei Wakikawa is a Special Researcher, Mari Mito is Technical Staff I, Yoichi Shinkai is a Principal Researcher at the Shinkai Cellular Memory Laboratory, and Fan Chi is an International Program Associate (at the time of the research). Yuzuru Itoh, Associate Professor  in the Department of Biological Sciences at the Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, have elucidated a series of molecular mechanisms that control how protein synthesis (translation) within mitochondria “ends.” They found that, thanks to the mechanism of ribosome recycling following translation termination, the next round of translation can resume without issue—a mechanism that truly embodies the adage “all’s well that ends well.”

These research findings are expected to contribute to our understanding of the mechanisms of mitochondria—which are responsible for human energy metabolism—as well as various diseases associated with mitochondrial translation abnormalities.

Mitochondria synthesize 13 types of proteins based on their own genetic code. Many mysteries remained regarding the molecular mechanisms responsible for how this synthesis ends—namely, translation termination, recycling, restart, and quality control.

In this study, the collaborative research group utilized the “MitoIP-Thor-Ribo-Seq method /MitoIP-Thor-Disome-Seq method”—to elucidate the complete picture of the molecular mechanisms underlying the termination of mitochondrial translation at a resolution of a single codon (a sequence of three bases).

This study will be published in the online edition of the scientific journal *Nature Communications* (dated July 21: July 21, Japan Standard Time).

Summary of this study (generated by Issei Takahashi)

Related Links

RIKEN

Journal