Super-resolution force spectroscopy reveals ribosomal motion at sub-nucleotide steps.

Probing biomolecular motion beyond a single nucleotide is technically challenging but fundamentally significant. We have developed super-resolution force spectroscopy (SURFS) with 0.5 pN force resolution and revealed that the ribosome moves by half a nucleotide upon the formation of the pre-translocation complex, which is beyond the resolution of other techniques.