Themes

Our work is divided into four Themes; each with a key objective. Members of the RiboCode team work collaboratively on each Theme.

Theme 1: Evolutionary genomics

Objective: Identify potential sites of ribosome specialisation and determine common mechanisms across eukaryotes.

Imagined phylogenetic tree, displaying variation in rate of change and composition across homologous sequences and, below, a small segment of a multiple sequence alignment showing variation in rates of change, presence and absence of domains and conserved regions across length of sequence
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Theme 2: mRNA translation

Objective: Determine which mRNAs are translated by various specialised ribosomes.

A comparison of workflows for Riboseq and selective Riboseq. Total riboseq purifies ribosomes and their associated RNAs, allowing global translational profiles to be determined. Selective riboseq purifies affinity tagged ribosomes and their associated RNAs, which allows specialised ribosome translational profiles to be determined.
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Theme 3: Structure of specialised ribosomes

Objective: Assess how variations in ribosome composition structurally regulate translation.

Cryo-electron microscopy averages of Drosophila testis polysomes and of footprinted Drosophila embryo polysomes, showing they contain tRNA at the mRNA channel, and therefore they translation-active
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Theme 4: Transformative technologies

Objective: Develop novel biophysical tools to probe ribosome specialisation.

Translocations of a ribosome through a nanopipette and associated ion current signal
Read more about Theme 4
Read our review: ‘Specialized ribosomes: integrating new insights and current challenges’
Read our Publications