TWINNING PROGRAM WITH ESTONIA, LATVIA, AND LITHUANIA

James Ofengand began his U.S.-Estonian Twinning project by visiting his colleague Jaanus Remme at the Tartu University Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology April 18-27, 2000. During the visit, he and Remme reviewed the results obtained in the Tartu lab on the set of Escherichia coli pseudouridine synthase deletion mutants that Ofengand had previously sent to him. They worked on a paper on the results and planned future experiments to be conducted in Tartu. On the way to Tartu, Ofengand also had the opportunity to stop off at the University of Copenhagen to consult with Prof. Steen Pedersen of the Department of Molecular Cell Biology. This side visit was made possible by a new Twinning Program feature allowing for collaborations with colleagues in Nordic countries. During the visit to Copenhagen, Ofengand and Pedersen reviewed related E. coli pseudouridine synthase studies being conducted on samples provided by Ofengand.

For the next stage of the Twinning project, the collaborators modified their originally planned schedule of visits to allow for an extended visit to Miami by one of Remme's students, Lauri Peil, from November 2000 through March 2001. Peil shared his expertise with Ofengand's students by teaching them his methods of preparing cell lysates and running them on sucrose gradients for ribosome preparation. In return, Peil learned how to delete genes in E. coli. In addition to this exchange of expertise, Peil's presence has also paid off in terms of research results. During his stay in Ofengand's lab, it was found that the strain of E. coli used for the experiments in Tartu was actually a mixture of two strains. Ofengand notes that "this would have been difficult to recognize if Mr. Peil, who did the experiments in Tartu, had not been here when we made this discovery." The experiments are now being repeated in Miami with the separated strains, and so far similar results are being obtained. The collaborative research has already led to a finding of some importance in the ribosome field regarding the role played in proper ribosome assembly by pseudouridine synthase R1uD and/or the pseudouridines it makes in 23S rRNA.

Update of Activities in 2001

Lauri Peil successfully completed his extended visit to the University of Miami on March 30, 2001. During the final state of Peil’s visit, Jaanus Remme spent a week in Miami to review the results of their joint research on the role of pseudouridines of ribosomal RNA in ribosome biogenesis, discuss additional experiments to be performed, and revise a joint manuscript in light of newly obtained data. On his way home to Estonia, Remme stopped off at a conference in Austin, Texas, where he presented a paper on the research conducted under this Twinning project. In early September 2001, James Ofengand paid a second visit to Tartu to make further revisions in the manuscript that were required due to issues that arose during the publication review process. On his way to Tartu, Ofengand stopped off at the International Protein Synthesis Conference in Pushchino, Russia, to make a presentation on his research findings. The joint manuscript prepared by Ofengand and Remme is now undergoing further revisions and is expected to be published in the near future. A no-cost extension through the end of 2002 has been granted in order to help offset ongoing communications costs and page charges.