Dissociability of free and peptidyl-tRNA bound ribosomes.

The influence of peptidyl-tRNA on the dissociation of yeast 80 S ribosomes into subunits was studied. For this purpose temperature-sensitive (ts) suppressor strain of yeast Saccharomyces cervisiae carrying a defect in peptide chain termination was used. It was found that peptidyl-tRNA did not influence the dissociation of ribosomes either at high salt concentration or in the presence of dissociation factor (DF) from yeast. After dissociation of yeast ribosomes in 0.5 M KCl, peptidyl-tRNA remains bound to the 60 S subunit. Some characteristics of the termination process and release of nascent polypeptides from yeast ribosomes are discussed.