Stop-codon read-through arises largely from molecular errors and is generally nonadaptive

Stop-codon read-through refers to the phenomenon that a ribosome goes past the stop codon and continues translating into the otherwise untranslated region (UTR) of a transcript. Recent ribosome-profiling experiments in eukaryotes uncovered widespread stop-codon read-through that also varies among tissues, prompting the adaptive hypothesis that stop-codon read-through is an important, regulated mechanism for generating proteome diversity. Here we propose and test a competing hypothesis that stop-codon read-through arises mostly from molecular errors and is largely nonadaptive. The error hypothesis makes distinct predictions about the probability of read-through, frequency of sequence motifs for read-through, and conservation of the read-through region, each of which is supported by genome-scale data from yeasts and fruit flies. Thus, except for the few cases with demonstrated functions, stop-codon read-through is generally nonadaptive. This finding, along with other molecular errors recently quantified, reveals a much less precise or orderly cellular life than is commonly thought.