Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 1995 Feb;69(2):1030-6.
doi: 10.1128/JVI.69.2.1030-1036.1995.

Translational inhibition by a human cytomegalovirus upstream open reading frame despite inefficient utilization of its AUG codon

J Cao  1 , A P Geballe
Affiliations

Translational inhibition by a human cytomegalovirus upstream open reading frame despite inefficient utilization of its AUG codon

J Cao et al. J Virol. 1995 Feb.

Abstract

The second of three short upstream open reading frames (uORF2) in the transcript leader of the human cytomegalovirus gp48 (gpUL4) virion glycoprotein gene inhibits downstream translation approximately 10-fold. Remarkably, this inhibition depends on the amino acid coding information of uORF2. In the current studies we demonstrate that expression of the cistron downstream from uORF2 depends on ribosomes bypassing the uORF2 AUG codon (AUG2) by a leaky scanning mechanism. Replacing the nucleotides surrounding the wild-type AUG2 codon with those optimal for translation initiation reduces downstream translation approximately 10-fold. Analyses of mutants in which uORF2 either overlaps or is in frame with the downstream reading frame reveal that the initiation frequency at the wild-type AUG2 codon is surprisingly low; rather, the majority of ribosomal subunits bypass the wild-type AUG2 codon because of its suboptimal context. We propose a model to explain this unprecedented example of a paradoxically strong inhibitory effect of an upstream ORF despite inefficient utilization of its initiation codon.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. J Virol. 1990 Jan;64(1):453-7 - PubMed
    1. Curr Top Microbiol Immunol. 1990;154:125-69 - PubMed
    1. Virology. 1990 Aug;177(2):657-67 - PubMed
    1. Virology. 1991 Jul;183(1):381-5 - PubMed
    1. J Virol. 1991 Dec;65(12):6782-9 - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources