ABSTRACT
The genetic code is usually shown as a codon table, where all 64 possible several base sequences are presented along with the amino acid or the termination signal that each encodes. The cell's translational apparatus reads this code as the ribosome moves along the messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA). This chapter refers to codon misreading, or alternative codon reading, as an event which seems to involve unexpected codon: anticodon interactions. Like transfer ribonucleic acid (tRNA) slipping, hopping involves the movement of aminoacyl-tRNA after it has correctly decoded an in-frame codon. However, in the hopping mechanism it is not possible to imagine the tRNA moving step by step along the mRNA, breaking and reforming base-pairs at each step. The message context is critical for all the programmed translational alternatives that have been discovered in genomes using the universal code.
