biology

Ron Kopito

Ron Kopito is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Ron Kopito rather than just read about it. In short: Ron Rieger Kopito (born 1954) is an American cell biologist and academic holding the position of Professor in the Department of Biology at Stanford University. He is most known for his work on proteostasis, particularly the role of ubiquitin and UFMylation in protein and ribosome quality control in the mammalian secretory pathway.

Key takeaways

Ron Kopito belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Ron Kopito to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Ron Kopito from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Ron Rieger Kopito (born 1954) is an American cell biologist and academic holding the position of Professor in the Department of Biology at Stanford University. He is most known for his work on proteostasis, particularly the role of ubiquitin and UFMylation in protein and ribosome quality control in the mammalian secretory pathway. Kopito is a Lifetime Fellow of the American Society for Cell Biology.

Education Kopito earned an A.B. in biochemistry from Bowdoin College in 1976. He then received his Ph.D. in nutritional biochemistry and metabolism from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1982.

Career Kopito was an NIH postdoctoral fellow and Lucille P. Markey Scholar at MIT and the Whitehead Institute from 1982 to 1986 under the mentorship of Harvey F. Lodish. In 1987, he joined the faculty of the Department of Biological Sciences (now the Department of Biology) at Stanford University, and became a full professor in 1996. His research work has included genetics, cell physiological characterization of SLC4A anion transporters and the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator, CFTR, defining the role of the ubiquitin proteasome system (UPS) in endoplasmic reticulum (ER) associated degradation (ERAD). He coined the term aggresome to describe intracellular inclusions that collect aggregated proteins and demonstrated that protein aggregates derived from the Huntington's disease gene product impair cellular proteostasis and can propagate between cells in a prion-like manner. He discovered that UFMylation of the large ribosomal subunit is required for ribosome-associated quality control and translocon recycling at the ER, resolving a 50-year-old cell biological mystery.

Awards and honors 1985 – Lucille P. Markey Scholar Award, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1989 – Presidential Young Investigator Award, National Science Foundation 1993 – Established Investigator Award, American Heart Association 2018 – Lifetime Fellow, American Society for Cell Biology

Bibliography Kopito, Ron; Lodish, Harvey (1985). "Primary structure and transmembrane orientation of the murine anion exchange protein". Nature. 316 (6025): 234–238. Bibcode:1985Natur.316..234K. doi:10.1038/316234a0. PMID 2410791. Kopito, Ron R.; Lee, Beth S.; Simmons, Donna M.; Lindsey, Ann E.; Morgans, Catherine W.; Schneider, Karin (1989). "Regulation of intracellular pH by a neuronal homolog of the erythrocyte anion exchanger". Cell. 59 (5): 927–937. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(89)90615-6. PMID 2686841. Gunderson, Kevin L.; Kopito, Ron R. (1995). "Conformational states of CFTR associated with channel gating: The role of ATP binding and hydrolysis". Cell. 82 (2): 231–239. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(95)90310-0. PMID 7543023. Ward, Cristina L.; Omura, Satoshi; Kopito, Ron R. (1995). "Degradation of CFTR by the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway". Cell. 83 (1): 121–127. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(95)90240-6. PMID 7553863. Bennett, Eric J.; Shaler, Thomas A.; Woodman, Ben; Ryu, Kwon-Yul; Zaitseva, Tatiana S.; Becker, Christopher H.; Bates, Gillian P.; Schulman, Howard; Kopito, Ron R. (2007). "Global changes to the ubiquitin system in Huntington's disease". Nature. 448 (7154): 704–708. Bibcode:2007Natur.448..704B. doi:10.1038/nature06022. PMID 17687326. Pearce, Margaret M. P.; Spartz, Ellen J.; Hong, Weizhe; Luo, Liqun; Kopito, Ron R. (2015). "Prion-like transmission of neuronal huntingtin aggregates to phagocytic glia in the Drosophila brain". Nature Communications. 6: 6768. Bibcode:2015NatCo...6.6768P. doi:10.1038/ncomms7768. PMC 4515032. PMID 25866135. Scavone, Francesco; Gumbin, Samantha C.; Da Rosa, Paul A.; Kopito, Ron R. (2023). "RPL26/uL24 UFMylation is essential for ribosome-associated quality control at the endoplasmic reticulum". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 120 (16) e2220340120. Bibcode:2023PNAS..12020340S. doi:10.1073/pnas.2220340120. PMC 10120006. PMID 37036982.

References

External links Ron Kopito publications indexed by Google Scholar

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Ron Kopito

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Ron Kopito claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Ron Kopito before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Ron Kopito ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Ron Kopito

In research: Ron Kopito appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Ron Kopito in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Ron Kopito is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1954 births, 21st-century American biologists, American cell biologists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Ron Kopito outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Ron Kopito in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Ron Kopito means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Ron Kopito out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Ron Kopito in simple terms?

Why does Ron Kopito matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Ron Kopito?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Ron Kopito.