Translational discrimination between embryonic and adult mouse globin mRNAs in the rabbit reticulocyte lysate system.

In the present study mouse adult (alpha, beta) and embryonic globin (x, y, z) mRNas are compared for their capacity of being translated in a micrococcus nuclease treated rabbit reticulocyte lysate. The results of these experiments indicate that: 1) alpha and beta adult RNAs are translated with a higher efficiency as compared to the alpha-like and beta-like embryonic mRNAs; 2) adult beta and embryonic beta-like messengers are translated more efficiently than their corresponding adult alpha and embryonic alpha-like messengers; 3) the alpha/beta synthetic ratio, both for adult and embryonic globins is highly dependent upon the concentration of globin mRNAs. For embryonic globins the ratio decreases from 0.21 at low mRNA concentration to 0.11 at high mRNA concentration. For adult globin mRNAs the alpha/beta chain synthetic ratio decreases from 1.4 to 0.9 within the same range of concentration.