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Updated: Nov 18, 2025

Single Molecule Fluorescence Energy Transfer Study of Ribosome Protein Synthesis
Published on: July 6, 2021
Conformational Shannon Entropy of mRNA Structures from Force Spectroscopy Measurements Predicts the Efficiency of -1
Matthew T J Halma1, Dustin B Ritchie1, Michael T Woodside1
1Department of Physics, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2E1, Canada.
Abstract:
-1 programmed ribosomal frameshifting (-1 PRF) is stimulated by structures in messenger RNA (mRNA), but the factors determining -1 PRF efficiency are unclear. We show that -1 PRF efficiency varies directly with the conformational heterogeneity of the stimulatory structure, quantified as the Shannon entropy of the state occupancy, for a panel of stimulatory structures with efficiencies from 2% to 80%. The correlation is force dependent and vanishes at forces above those applied by the ribosome. These results support the hypothesis that heterogeneous conformational dynamics are a key factor in stimulating -1 PRF.
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