Latrèche, L., Jean - Jean, O., Driscoll, D.M., Chavatte, L. Novel structural determinants in human SECIS elements modulate the translational recoding of UGA as selenocysteine. (lerner.ccf.org)
In ongoing projects, we aim to elucidate the mechanism and regulation of selenocysteine incorporation by determining how ribosomes distinguish between UGA / Sec and UGA / Stop codons, how mutations in SBP2 impact the expression of the selenoproteome, and how the hierarchy of selenoprotein synthesis is regulated in selenium deficiency. (lerner.ccf.org)
But the researchers found that the protozoan also uses UGA to make the amino acid selenocysteine, a dual amino acid coding not yet seen in any other organism. (sciencemag.org)