The cytotoxins alpha-sarcin and ricin retain their specificity when tested on a synthetic oligoribonucleotide (35-mer) that mimics a region of 28 S ribosomal ribonucleic acid.

An oligoribonucleotide (35-mer) that mimics the alpha-sarcin and the ricin region of eukaryotic 28 S rRNA was transcribed in vitro from a synthetic template with T7 RNA polymerase and was used to test whether the specificity of the hydrolysis by the toxins was retained. alpha-Sarcin, at a low concentration, cleaved a single phosphodiester bond on the 3' side of a guanosine residue in the synthetic oligomer that corresponds to G-4325 in 28 S rRNA, the site of action of the toxin in intact ribosomes. At a high concentration of alpha-sarcin, the substrate (35-mer) was hydrolyzed after each of its purines. alpha-Sarcin was without an effect on a synthetic RNA (20-mer) that reproduces the near universal sequence of nucleotides in the loop, but lacks the stem, of the toxin's domain. Thus, the specificity of the attack of alpha-sarcin on a precise region of 28 S rRNA appears to be contingent on the sequence of the nucleotides and the structure of the domain. Ricin depurinated a nucleotide in the synthetic oligomer (35-mer), and in the presence of aniline the phosphoribose backbone was cleaved at a position that conforms to A-4324 in 28 S rRNA, the site of action of the toxin in vivo.