Ricki Lewis | May 14, 2000 | 4 min read
Introducing RNA Polymerase The long-sought crystal structure of RNA polymerase II, aka PolII, reveals a complex and tenacious machine. As the linchpin in gene expression, that machine "is arguably the most important protein in biology," says Roger Kornberg, professor of structural biology at Stanford University School of Medicine, who led the two-decade-long effort (P. Cramer et al., "Architecture of RNA polymerase II and implications for the transcription mechanism," Science, 288:640-9, April