Professor Dr Marina V. Rodnina

Research Priorities: quantitative biochemistry, RNA-protein interaction, ribosome function and dynamics, quality control in protein biosynthesis, fast kinetics, enzyme catalysis, function of antibiotics, translation process, mechanisms of GTPases in translation, biophysical methods, protein biosynthesis, fluorescence measurements
Marina Rodnina is a biochemist and expert on large protein complexes. She has developed new methodological approaches for studying ribosome functions and further elucidated its mode of operation in protein biosynthesis.
Ribosomes are the power plants of cells. During protein biosynthesis in the cell, they translate the genetic hereditary information into a chain of amino acids, which then folds into a protein. Hundreds, sometimes thousands of amino acids have to be put in the correct order in this translation process. A single error in the chain can cause the protein to malfunction. With one of her major discoveries, Marina Rodnina has elucidated a complex selection mechanism that ribosomes use to keep the error rate in translation low.
The effort for these investigations is enormous because ribosomes are tiny. The researchers led by Marina Rodnina employ biophysical methods such as fluorescence measurements and fast kinetics. The working group is a global leader in developing and applying these complex methods. With the help of a 3D cryo-electron microscope, they could also show a ribosome in action for the first time. For the film sequence, ribosomes in a solution were excited and then shock-frozen at different stages. An electron microscope was thus able to take pictures of different phases of protein biosynthesis.
With her research, Marina Rodnina has significantly expanded the knowledge about translational processes. These findings help clarify the causes of diseases and provide the basis for developing new drugs.