Abst:
In this talk, we first introduce the dynamics of bacterial transcription initiation and its effect on the gene expression noise, highlighting the importance of the intermediate steps in transcription initiation [1].
We then move on to the translation initiation process, where the framework parallel to the transcription initiation is applicable but the occlusion time is much more important compared to the transcription initiation. Using the model, we discuss the experimental results showing that the strength of the ribosome binding site can affect the protein synthesis rate by altering not only the translation initiation rate but also the premature transcription termination rate and the mRNA lifetime [2].

[1] Mitarai N, Semsey S, Sneppen K. Dynamic competition between transcription initiation and repression: Role of nonequilibrium steps in cell-to-cell heterogeneity. Physical Review E. 2015;92(2):022710.
[2] Eriksen M, Sneppen K, Pedersen S, Mitarai N. Occlusion of the ribosome binding site connects the translational initiation frequency, mRNA stability and premature transcription termination. Frontiers in microbiology. 2017;8:362.