title: Genetic code flexibility in microorganisms: novel mechanisms and impact on physiology.
abstract: The genetic code, initially thought to be universal and immutable, is now known to contain many variations, including biased codon usage, codon reassignment, ambiguous decoding and recoding. As a result of recent advances in the areas of genome sequencing, biochemistry, bioinformatics and structural biology, our understanding of genetic code flexibility has advanced substantially in the past decade. In this Review, we highlight the prevalence, evolution and mechanistic basis of genetic code variations in microorganisms, and we discuss how this flexibility of the genetic code affects microbial physiology.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, Texas 77030, USA.
authors.forename: Jiqiang
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ling
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 5C1, Canada.|Department of Chemistry, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 5C1, Canada.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: O'Donoghue
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520-8114, USA.|Department of Chemistry, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520-8114, USA.
authors.forename: Dieter
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Söll
mesh_terms: D001105:Archaea / Q000235:genetics*; D001419:Bacteria / Q000235:genetics*; D003062:Codon; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D005815:Genetic Code
chemical_list: D003062:Codon