| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
Perspective
1 Institute for Cell and Molecular Biosciences, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Newcastle, United Kingdom; and 2 Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM) EMI-U 0110, Institut des Cordeliers, Paris, France
Antisense RNA was a rather uncommon term in a physiology environment until short interfering RNAs emerged as the tool of choice to knock down the expression of specific genes. As a consequence, the concept of RNA having regulatory potential became widely accepted. Yet, there is more to come. Computational studies suggest that between 15 and 25% of mammalian genes overlap, giving rise to pairs of sense and antisense RNAs. The resulting transcripts potentially interfere with each other’s processing, thus representing examples of RNA-mediated gene regulation by endogenous, naturally occurring antisense transcripts. Concerns that the large-scale antisense transcription may represent transcriptional noise rather than a gene regulatory mechanism are strongly opposed by recent reports. A relatively small, well-defined group of antisense or noncoding transcripts is linked to monoallelic gene expression as observed in genomic imprinting, X chromosome inactivation, and clonal expression of B and T leukocytes. For the remaining, much larger group of bidirectionally transcribed genes, however, the physiological consequences of antisense transcription as well as the cellular mechanism(s) involved remain largely speculative.
overlapping genes; gene regulation; epigenetics
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  A. K. Ebralidze, F. C. Guibal, U. Steidl, P. Zhang, S. Lee, B. Bartholdy, M. A. Jorda, V. Petkova, F. Rosenbauer, G. Huang, et al. PU.1 expression is modulated by the balance of functional sense and antisense RNAs regulated by a shared cis-regulatory element Genes & Dev., August 1, 2008; 22(15): 2085 - 2092. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 M. Carlile, P. Nalbant, K. Preston-Fayers, G. S. McHaffie, and A. Werner Processing of naturally occurring sense/antisense transcripts of the vertebrate Slc34a gene into short RNAs Physiol Genomics, June 1, 2008; 34(1): 95 - 100. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 A. Hinas, J. Reimegard, E. G. H. Wagner, W. Nellen, V. R. Ambros, and F. Soderbom The small RNA repertoire of Dictyostelium discoideum and its regulation by components of the RNAi pathway Nucleic Acids Res., November 29, 2007; 35(20): 6714 - 6726. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 J. S. Mattick A new paradigm for developmental biology J. Exp. Biol., May 1, 2007; 210(9): 1526 - 1547. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 N. Eliahu, A. Igbaria, M. S. Rose, B. A. Horwitz, and S. Lev Melanin Biosynthesis in the Maize Pathogen Cochliobolus heterostrophus Depends on Two Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinases, Chk1 and Mps1, and the Transcription Factor Cmr1 Eukaryot. Cell, March 1, 2007; 6(3): 421 - 429. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Werner, G. Schmutzler, M. Carlile, C. G. Miles, and H. Peters Expression profiling of antisense transcripts on DNA arrays Physiol Genomics, February 12, 2007; 28(3): 294 - 300. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 S. Katiyar-Agarwal, R. Morgan, D. Dahlbeck, O. Borsani, A. Villegas Jr., J.-K. Zhu, B. J. Staskawicz, and H. Jin A pathogen-inducible endogenous siRNA in plant immunity PNAS, November 21, 2006; 103(47): 18002 - 18007. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 S. Gustincich, A. Sandelin, C. Plessy, S. Katayama, R. Simone, D. Lazarevic, Y. Hayashizaki, and P. Carninci The complexity of the mammalian transcriptome J. Physiol., September 1, 2006; 575(2): 321 - 332. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 J. S. Mattick and I. V. Makunin Non-coding RNA. Hum. Mol. Genet., April 15, 2006; 15(suppl_1): R17 - R29. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
| Visit Other APS Journals Online |
