iansmith
Jun3-04, 05:54 PM
A non-protein-coding RNA regulates a neighboring gene by simply being turned on | By David Secko
Although it's becoming more apparent that the intergenic space between protein-coding genes—often referred to as "junk"—is actively transcribed and often produces non–protein-coding RNAs, the role of these RNAs and their transcription is largely unknown. In the June 3 Nature, Joseph Martens, Lisa Laprade, and Fred Winston report a previously unknown form of gene regulation involving a non–protein-coding RNA, SRG1, which can regulate a neighboring gene by simply being transcribed.
"I was very pleased to see another role for intergenic transcription which primarily implicates the process of transcription itself rather than the non-coding RNA, which in this case, may be just a by-product," said Peter Fraser, from the Babraham Institute, Cambridge, UK, who was not involved in the study.
The work began with a Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene called SER3, which catalyzes a step in serine biosynthesis and was previously found to be tightly repressed by the yeast switch–sniff complex. This was unusual, since the switch–sniff complex is normally associated with activation, not repression, said senior author Fred Winston, from Harvard Medical School, Boston.
When the researchers performed chromatin immunoprecipitation experiments to analyze the SER3 promoter, they found significant levels of the TATA-binding protein and RNA polymerase II bound to the upstream intergenic region of the SER3 gene. "It was surprising that all the factors necessary for transcription appeared to be there, even though the gene was not on," Winston told The Scientist.
http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20040603/01
Although it's becoming more apparent that the intergenic space between protein-coding genes—often referred to as "junk"—is actively transcribed and often produces non–protein-coding RNAs, the role of these RNAs and their transcription is largely unknown. In the June 3 Nature, Joseph Martens, Lisa Laprade, and Fred Winston report a previously unknown form of gene regulation involving a non–protein-coding RNA, SRG1, which can regulate a neighboring gene by simply being transcribed.
"I was very pleased to see another role for intergenic transcription which primarily implicates the process of transcription itself rather than the non-coding RNA, which in this case, may be just a by-product," said Peter Fraser, from the Babraham Institute, Cambridge, UK, who was not involved in the study.
The work began with a Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene called SER3, which catalyzes a step in serine biosynthesis and was previously found to be tightly repressed by the yeast switch–sniff complex. This was unusual, since the switch–sniff complex is normally associated with activation, not repression, said senior author Fred Winston, from Harvard Medical School, Boston.
When the researchers performed chromatin immunoprecipitation experiments to analyze the SER3 promoter, they found significant levels of the TATA-binding protein and RNA polymerase II bound to the upstream intergenic region of the SER3 gene. "It was surprising that all the factors necessary for transcription appeared to be there, even though the gene was not on," Winston told The Scientist.
http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20040603/01